A Blue Gravel Path
by azriona
Summary: This is the last place the Doctor wants to go. This is the last person Jackie wants to see. This is the last chance Rose will get. This is the last choice any of them will make. Part Four of the Crossroads Series.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** Doctor Who is not mine. It's very sad.  
**Warnings:** PG

**Story Summary**... This is the last place the Doctor wants to go. This is the last person Jackie wants to see. This is the last chance Rose will get. This is the last choice any of them will make. Part Four of the Crossroads Series.

**Chapter One: Calm Before the Storm**... Rose Tyler and the Doctor are content to lead a quiet life with their two children aboard the TARDIS. Dex, age four (minus one month), has other ideas about the "quiet life".

**A/N:** Updates every Wednesday.

* * *

**Chapter One: Calm Before the Storm**

"Just a little bite," coaxed Rose Tyler as she held a baby spoon up to the toddler in the high chair. The blonde-haired, blue-eyed child kept her mouth firmly closed, and shook her head from side to side in an attempt to dodge the spoon. She only ended up with a thin raspberry-colored stripe on her cheeks, as if her mouth had been extended.

Rose sighed in exasperation. "They're _good_ raspberries, Nina, Mummy promises."

Nina did not seem to care. She scrunched her nose up, which made her look perfectly adorable, and pressed her lips together. She couldn't speak yet – or _wouldn't_, no one was really certain – but Rose had the idea that if Nina could say something, she would happily tell her mother exactly what to do with the raspberries that were being served as her pre-nap snack.

Rose sighed and tried again. "Nina, sweetheart, just a little bit?"

"One Time Tot down, one to go," said the Doctor cheerfully as he walked into the kitchen with a bounce in his step. "Mine's asleep and dreaming – how's the second one coming along?"

Rose sat back from the baby, disgruntled. Bad enough that Nina wouldn't eat; worse that the Doctor had obviously had no trouble at all with Nina's older brother. "She won't eat the raspberries."

"Of course not, they're raspberries." The Doctor leaned over the baby from behind and tickled her. Nina giggled, and strained in her chair towards him, careful to keep her mouth firmly closed. She was a baby, but not a fool. "Hello, Nina, are you being good for Mummy?"

Rose crossed her arms and glared at them both. She wasn't sure which of the two were more impossible: the Doctor, who claimed that baby talk stunted mental growth and that it should never be spoken around infants (until he thought Rose was on the other side of the TARDIS, in which case the baby talk sprang forth), or their daughter, who for the previous two weeks had refused to eat anything that was not a banana.

"She's flirting with you."

"Do you think I'm going to save you from the nasty raspberries, Nina?" The Doctor tickled Nina again and grinned at her. "She's a clever Time Baby."

"She's going to be a starving Time Baby, we're clear out of bananas."

"Easy enough to find more," the Doctor said cheerfully, and lifted Nina out of the chair. He twisted her to face him and tossed her in the air, catching her easily. "You don't want nasty old raspberries anyway, do you, Nina?"

"She won't if you keep calling them nasty," said Rose dryly. "I know bananas are good and all, but I'd like her to have _something_ else in her diet."

"She needs the potassium. It's very important for the development of neuron functions, including brain patterns and nerve reactions. As well as a load of other things. The more bananas she eats, the better for her brain."

"She's going to get potassium poisoning!"

The Doctor frowned, bouncing Nina lightly. "You can have that?"

"If anyone could, it would be Nina. Being a clever Time Baby and all that. If she won't eat anything in this kitchen, then I can't exactly keep her fed."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "You've managed to wean her in the last two hours?"

Rose sighed and tossed the bowl of mashed raspberries onto the table. "_That's_ just supplemental. She's only nine months, and I won't wean her for another three months at least. Dex got a whole year, Nina gets a whole year. And about Dex—"

"Asleep," the Doctor said smugly as he sat across the table from Rose and pulled the bowl of raspberries closer. "Read him a chapter on temporal abnormalities in complex ecosystems and he was straight out."

"I recall having Beatrix Potter before naptime, you know."

"When you put him down, you can read him stories about bunnies in gardens. When I put him down, we lay the building blocks of a temporal education which will help him pilot the TARDIS someday." The Doctor took a mouthful of raspberries and made a large show of chewing as Nina watched curiously.

Rose tried to be annoyed, but burst out laughing anyway. "He fell asleep, he won't remember!"

"That's the best time to learn something," said the Doctor. "Children sleep in order to process the information they learn whilst awake. Mmm, raspberries."

"She won't buy it," sang Rose.

"Good, I like raspberries too much to share. Almost as good as bananas, they are." The Doctor took another bite, and Nina's gaze turned suspicious.

Rose sat back in her chair, watching them. It was funny, how easily they'd slipped into parenthood. According to her superwatch (which now kept track of the children's information, including relative age, temperature, and distance from Rose) Dex would be four years old in another month. Rose couldn't imagine life before him. Her son was curious and loud and funny and loving and exactly like his father in all the wrong ways. He was in trouble more often than he was not, and Rose absolutely adored him. Sarah Jane had given her a camera when he was born, and Rose used it every single day, from every single angle, and quickly learned how to transmit the photographs to her mother – as well as anyone else who cared to see them. Jack claimed to have wallpapered his office with them, but Rose knew better than to believe him.

Nina was another baby altogether. She was good and sweet and quiet and loved nothing more than to be cuddled, but she had enough personality to throw a tantrum so stupendous that even the TARDIS stopped mid-flight to observe, amazed at what one pair of lungs could manage. Rose dreaded the day when her daughter began talking, but still looked forward to hearing what that determined little mind had to say.

The Doctor took another bite of raspberries, and Nina's bottom lip trembled, just a bit. He scraped the bowl with the spoon as he chewed, and offered her the last little bit. Nina hesitated, opened her mouth cautiously, and took a bite. The Doctor swallowed.

"There," he said triumphantly. "They're not so awful, are they?"

Nina blew, and raspberries splattered across the Doctor's face and tie. Rose burst into a fresh round of laughter and reached for the baby.

"Good show, Nina," she told her daughter as she carried her over to the sink to wash off her face. "Silly old Dad, making you eat the nasty raspberries."

"Oi! Could I have a towel here?"

Rose tossed him one of the towels on the counter, and continued wiping Nina's hands and face with a damp cloth. "So, duck, tell me which you'd rather – a pretty story about ducks and foxes with Mummy, or a scary Time Lord list with lots of long words with Dad?"

Nina leaned forward and wrapped her chubby arms around her mother's neck, and Rose picked her back up from the counter.

"At least Dex likes me," grumbled the Doctor as he furiously blotted his tie with the towel, and Rose leaned over to give him a kiss. Nina made a smacking sound to imitate her mother.

"We like you just fine. And Nina wants you to listen to the story, too."

Nina nodded her head very solemnly. It amazed Rose, how quickly her babies began to understand speech, even if they couldn't quite speak yet. She half thought that Nina was thinking in complex sentences sometimes, although she couldn't say so much as Mummy or Dad, and hardly ever babbled in unintelligible baby-talk. Dex had babbled continuously since he was three months old, sometimes while eating, often while sleeping, and almost without any of them realizing it, his babbles had turned into actual English. No one knew what Dex's first word was, because by the time Martha had pointed out that the boy was speaking fairly clearly for an 18-month old child, he'd been doing it for several days already.

The Doctor faked a great sigh and followed them down the corridor to the baby's room, which was still connected to their own for nighttime emergencies. It was decorated in yellows and blues, with ducks running around the border – literally, running around the borders, changing their positions and activities only when no one was looking. Rose couldn't determine if the ducks moved themselves, or if the TARDIS just liked to entertain herself. Either way, Nina loved the ducks. She would spend hours just staring at them, completely mesmerized. If on some remote planet, there existed anything remotely resembling a duck, Nina was guaranteed to spot it and demand a closer inspection.

Rose settled herself in the rocking chair and pulled a book from the shelves just beside it. "Listen to the story of Jemima Puddle-duck," she began reading to Nina, who snuggled contentedly beside her, thumb firmly in her mouth.

"She's sucking her thumb," observed the Doctor from his position at the door. Gallifreyan babies, he claimed, did not suck their thumbs, and the fact that Nina had slipped into the habit bothered him considerably.

"She's a baby, babies do that," said Rose automatically before continuing mid-sentence. "Who was annoyed because the farmer's wife would not let her hatch her own eggs."

"The one about the little prince is quite good," continued the Doctor. "Traveling through space, wanting sheep. Even has a rose in it."

"Prissy flower wrapped in a glass cage. Not much better than cotton wool, if you ask me," retorted Rose, and turned the page. "Her sister-in-law, Mrs. Rebeccah Puddle-duck, was perfectly willing to—"

"Of course, he does die at the end. Suicide by snake, nasty way to go. I suppose no one dies in a Beatrix Potter book. Especially not one about foxes and ducklings. Wouldn't do at all."

Rose sighed. "You could be looking for bananas."

"You invited me to naptime reading."

"Nina is dis-inviting you."

"Nina is already asleep," the Doctor pointed out, and when Rose glanced at her daughter, she was surprised to see the little girl already asleep, her mouth loose around her thumb.

The Doctor hopped up from the ground and gently took the baby. He cradled Nina for a moment, resting his forehead against hers with eyes closed. Rose lay her head back and watched them, once again adoring the sight of the Doctor and his daughter together. She knew, without hearing it, that the Doctor was speaking to the child in her sleep, whispering words in Gallifreyan, wrapping the baby's mind in the comforting security of a world she'd never know. Nina's hand drifted up to her father's face and rested on his check. Rose grinned as her daughter copied the move long since signifying a desire to interact telepathically. Even in sleep, Nina imitated her mother. After a few moments, the Doctor settled the baby into her crib, gently pulled the thumb from her mouth, and brushed her forehead with his fingertips.

"How long?" asked Rose quietly. It was another moment before the Doctor turned to her, still wearing the soft, contented smile he had whenever he interacted with his children.

"Oh, she'll be asleep for two hours at least," he reported. "Dex, maybe another ninety minutes."

"Useful skill you've picked up," she said, lifting her hands so that he could pull her from the chair. "Reading their thoughts to determine how long they'll sleep."

"Well worth keeping me around for, I think," the Doctor agreed, and pulled her into him, wrapping his arms around her. "So, ninety minutes with nothing to do and no children to watch – tell me, Rose Tyler, what would you like to do?"

"Hmm." Rose wrinkled her nose. "Ninety minutes, children asleep, no cloister bells, no guests aboard. I think there's only one thing we _can_ do in this circumstance."

The Doctor grinned.

"Obviously, we need to repair the damaged strut in the console room."

The Doctor's grin fell.

"Chin up, you said you needed help to do it, and I've got ninety child-free minutes, with your guarantee. That horrid crack has been hurting the TARDIS. We ought to repair it before she gets worse and deposits us somewhere entirely inappropriate."

"The Sontorans," said the Doctor glumly, thinking of the last "adventure". "Or the Fendahls."

"I was thinking Elizabethan England, actually, but yes, those would be bad too."

The Doctor sighed. "I told you, I'll take you back there any time you like. As long as it's after Elizabeth is dead."

"You have to go back sometime. Martha said that Elizabeth knew you in 1588 too, you've got to go back and actually _meet_ her."

"She thinks I have a companion named Janie," said the Doctor. "No Janie, no need to go to Elizabeth. Ergo, sic, qui – I will not go."

"You look silly spouting Latin when you aren't wearing glasses."

He stopped her mouth with a kiss, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, only too happy to oblige him. Two children who took very short naps and a cranky TARDIS which often needed repairs did not generally allow for an hour's worth of together time.

"We'll go find Jack," murmured the Doctor through the kiss, and Rose pulled away.

"I – ah – what?"

"To repair the strut. You have children, I have Jack. TARDIS is repaired, the hour is ours, and I get what I want."

"I have issues with you having Jack."

"He has issues with me having you," replied the Doctor cheekily, and without even a glance at his sleeping daughter, walked Rose backwards and into their adjoining room. "Let's stop talking about Jack."

"You brought him up."

"Only to point out that fixing the strut now is entirely unnecessary. I'm sure they have bananas in Cardiff."

"Are you sure? What about the Great Banana Shortage of 2015?"

"We'll land in 2014."

Rose's knees hit the bed, and she tumbled onto it, with the Doctor following. "I think Jack said 2014 was off-limits – that's the year it was on Pete's World when you pulled me through, before you collapsed time. We aren't to go anywhere near the crossroads in 2014, Jack said. Captain's orders."

"2013." The Doctor laid a light trail of kisses from her ear to her neck, and Rose's eyes fluttered shut.

"We spent six months in 2013 when Nina was born and Dex had flu."

"Rose," groaned the Doctor, his head falling against her shoulder. "If you don't stop yammering on, I'm going to have to fix the strut in the console room."

Rose grabbed him by his ears and pulled him up just enough to kiss his mouth. "Next stop, Cardiff," she said sternly, and he nodded in reply because his tongue was otherwise occupied.

* * *

If the TARDIS could frown, she would. Not being in possession of a mouth, frowning wasn't a possibility. She could hum disapprovingly, however, so this is what she did the moment Dex slipped into the console room, his hair still mussed from sleep and his brown eyes bright and curious.

The hum did nothing to deter the small boy creeping toward the console, however. Dex nearly always heard the TARDIS hum disapprovingly; it was as familiar to him as his own hearts beating, so he didn't pay any attention at all. If Dex made breakfast for his parents to eat in bed – disapproving hum, mostly about the resulting fire in the kitchen. If Dex crawled into Nina's crib – disapproving hum, mostly about the crib collapsing under his weight. If Dex watered the vines in the garden – disapproving hum, but how was Dex to know you only fed Krespan vines with vinegar?

Dex was four years old – well, _nearly_, close enough to call himself four, surely, and that was only according to Mum's watch. Dex felt much older. He'd met four-year-olds on most of the planets and while some of them were quite old indeed, most of them couldn't do half the things he could. He could read, and write, and do algebraic computations in his head with only a little bit of prompting from Dad. He could make a prawn mayo sandwich and pour a glass of milk without spilling a drop. He could arm-wrestle Uncle Jack and win, and he could name every bone in the human body in Latin, just like Aunt Martha had taught him.

Aunt Sarah Jane called him clever, and seemed to think he was very funny. Dex didn't know _why_, because he never tried to be funny. She was always laughing at him, which didn't exactly sit well with Dex, and once they were married when Dex was older, he'd put a stop to it. Wives didn't laugh at husbands. Mum didn't laugh at Dad, except when she was with Aunt Sarah Jane, and that was only because Aunt Sarah Jane was a Bad Influence. But Aunt Sarah Jane wouldn't be a Bad Influence once Dex married her and showed her how it was done.

"I can fly the TARDIS," Dex had told Aunt Sarah Jane the previous week. "I'm going to fly it to Alpha Centauri and back."

"Oh, can you?" asked Aunt Sarah Jane, eyes full of mirth and pretty hair curling on her shoulders.

Dex stomped his foot. "I _can_. I'm the best pilot ever, I'm heaps better than Dad."

"Hard to be worse," Aunt Sarah Jane said, and she and Mum laughed for a long time. Dad picked Dex up, tucked him under an arm, and carried him out to the sound of their amusement.

"Please don't encourage them," Dad said. Dex hadn't actually meant to encourage anyone to do anything, but he was still plopped in the rose garden with Nina, unable to further impress his future wife.

He _could_ fly the TARDIS.

Well, _sort_ of fly the TARDIS. Dad let him hold a control lever while he raced around like mad. Mummy and Nina didn't do anything; they just sat on the jump seat and watched. It was very important work, Dex knew. Without holding that lever, they might crash into the Vortex and land in some awful horrible place, like Lezzabethangland, which was full of dragons and pirates and ghost-ships and some frightening race called Thees Panyards, who would sprinkle him with salt and sour cream and eat him up like a baked potato. (No butter, though, Panyards don't like butter.) Sometimes, when even Dad tired of temporal abnormalities as bedtime stories, he told the most fantastic tales of how bloodthirsty and horrible Panyards were, how they'd split him in two and gobble him up, and if he should ever find himself in Lezzabethangland, where the horrid Panyards lived, he should stay in the TARDIS, in his room, preferably under his bed.

Dex desperately wanted to meet a Panyard, and see if they had jagged teeth. And then he wanted to catch a dragon for a pet, and name it Henry.

(Henry would be a good name for a dragon, Dex thought.)

Dex approached the control panel and tried to lift himself up to see the instruments better, his feet kicking out below. The disapproving hum was louder now as Dex flailed, trying to find a foothold before his toes found root on exposed piping. He looked eagerly at the panel, trying to determine which was the proper start-up button. Dex thought it was a button. It was mostly likely a button. He was fairly certain he remembered his father hitting a button.

Maybe.

Go to Lezzabethangland, see a Panyard, find a dragon and bring it back to Aunt Sarah Jane, who would be so overcome with remorse for not believing him in the first place, she would instantly agree to marry him when he was older. Besides, Dex really _did_ know how to fly the TARDIS. He'd watched his father do it a thousand times. This button, that lever, run around in circles, bang the keyboard with the mallet, and they were always there.

The TARDIS's hum turned from disapproving to frantic.

Dex slipped a little, and his toes flailed out again, banging against wires and levers and knocking one particular connection out of alignment. The TARDIS let out a rather impatient and abused squeal, like metal running against each other, and Dex caught his foothold again.

"Next stop, Lezzabethangland!" he hollered, and banged down hard on the closest button he could reach.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Doctor Who is not mine. It's very sad.  
**Warnings:** PG

**Story Summary**... This is the last place the Doctor wants to go. This is the last person Jackie wants to see. This is the last chance Rose will get. This is the last choice any of them will make. Part Four of the Crossroads Series.

**Chapter Two: Mo(u)rning in Jackie's World**... The twins Donald and Molly are lucky, Jackie sometimes thinks: they don't remember their older sister Rose. Jackie remembers Rose all too well, and some days, she envies her younger children their lack of memory.

* * *

**Chapter Two: Mo(u)rning in Jackie's World**

Jackie Tyler woke with a start. For a moment she wondered if her mobile had been ringing, but it lay dark and silent on the bedside table, resting atop the digital clock which blinked 12:14. Blinking meant loss of power, and the strong winds at the window confirmed the possibility. It was dark in the room, and not a sound could be heard save for the weather outside of it. For a moment, Jackie wasn't sure where she was, much less the time.

She rolled her head away from the blinking numbers, unwilling to move an arm out from beneath the warmth of the blankets to turn the clock off. The light didn't bother her, nor did the storm outside, although she hoped Donald wasn't in it, trying to drive home from work. Jackie almost asked Pete if he was awake and had heard Donald come in, before she realized the pillow beside her was empty. The memory sparked by Pete's unused pillow cut like a knife, and she looked back up to the ceiling, where a red glow pulsed in time with the numbers on the clock.

Why she had a clock, Jackie didn't know. She had nowhere to go anymore, no appointments to keep, no one to visit who did not visit her. Mickey and his daughter came every day. Theresa and Janice from the tennis club came at least twice a week. Molly, of course, was in India, or Nepal, or some other place where the telephone reception was less than stellar, but she called every day. Donald lived at home, driving out to the hospital for his night shift in the ER every evening and returning near dawn smelling of cleaning alcohol and blood.

The wind howled outside the windows, and Jackie closed her eyes, wondering if sleep would evade her again. It was the storm that had woken her, had started the clock to blinking. She wondered how long it would be before dawn, when Rose would call on the mobile as she did every morning, without fail. Today, there might even be photographs of children who grew terribly slowly and were fantastically brilliant. Jackie's grandchildren, the ones she'd never seen nor hugged. In another world, they might have clambered over her bed and played hide-and-go-seek under her pillows. They would have called her Gran or Grammy or perhaps just Grandma, and Jackie would have showered them with kisses and hugs and sugar when their parents weren't looking.

Jackie never tired of looking at her grandchildren. But looking at the photographs of Rose was like looking into a deep well. It was a bit, she imagined, like if she were the Doctor looking at the expanse of past and present, seeing time as clearly as if it were sitting next to her on the bus. Rose, in her pictures, looked impossibly young, the same age as her twenty-years-younger siblings, who didn't even remember they had an older sister sometimes. It was just as well; they knew nothing of a parallel universe, or of a previous Jackie, or of Torchwood, or the Doctor. They'd known all this, once, but somehow over the course of time, the knowledge had slipped away, been forgotten, and it wasn't truly possible to remember a sister you didn't even know.

Jackie didn't talk about Rose with Donald or Molly. They hadn't asked about her in years. It simply never came up, and because Rose only ever called in the early mornings, before the rest of the world was awake, there was never a need. Sometimes, in the course of the day, Jackie would forget about Rose herself for a moment, right up to the moment she went to bed and found the mobile in her pocket. She would remember her daughter, then, the blonde laughter and the fierce longing, and Jackie would place the mobile on the bedside table, ready for when Rose called in the morning before dawn.

Sometimes, Jackie was never sure if the calls were real, or simply dreams. Perhaps she'd dreamed it all, that parallel world. Perhaps she'd never had a first Pete, did not have an older daughter named Rose, had never lived in the Powell Estates, did not once meet a man who wore a leather jacket or a brown trench coat, depending on his face.

It might have helped, if Mickey talked about Rose. He never brought her up, either. He stopped by around teatime, and Jackie always wondered if it would be the day one of them would mention her, but it never was. Mickey was older now, grey at his temples, and he needed glasses to read. This was how Rose should look, thought Jackie, when she was fifty. She would be grey, and wear glasses to see, and be a bit dumpier about the waist. There would be wrinkles at her eyes and her lips, Rose had laughed so much!

But Rose wasn't fifty. She wasn't even forty. Rose was thirty-two years old, and would be thirty-two for another four years of Jackie's life. By the time Rose was fifty, Jackie would be long since dead.

That was the price of having a daughter in parallel world: Rose was trapped in time, not quite a flower in amber, because Rose wasn't static. She moved, but so slowly that Jackie never noticed it.

It was almost worse, Jackie thought, knowing her daughter was alive and young than it would have been if she'd gone into the parallel world without further contact. No phone calls, no photographs, no way of knowing if she were alive or not. Then, at least, Jackie could have imagined her aging, imagined her children grown, imagined her daughter as a grandmother herself.

Trying to imagine these things now did not work when Rose, young and cheerful and often with the weariness that accompanies two small children, called every morning before dawn, to tell her the news of her world.

Just once, Jackie wished she could see Rose older. Knowing that Rose would live on, that was something. But to see her daughter just once, grey and wrinkled, would have given Jackie some sense of accomplishment, to know that something she had produced, almost entirely without help, would turn out all right.

The rain continued to beat down on the windowpanes, and the red light from the clock continued to blink. Now there was a tapping sound, rapping against the walls of the house, and Jackie glanced to the windows to see the old oak tree's branches, blown close by the wind, beating a tattoo on the glass. It was rapid and uneven, much like her own heart in recent weeks, beating an untenable path to its end. The doctor to which Donald had taken her had frowned, and said she must be careful, but Jackie knew what that meant. Each beat of her heart counted down to some unknown but predetermined number, and Jackie could sense it had every possibility of losing steam and giving up before it got there.

In the thirty years since Rose had disappeared into a blue box at Torchwood, Jackie Tyler had raised two children, lived with a good man, headed half a dozen charities, and won the tennis championship in her age bracket at the club for three years running. She'd served coffee to victims of the Cyberman war, read to children at the local hospitals, hosted a smashing Christmas party that boasted at least twenty gate-crashers every year, and even had a short-lived spell as a daytime talk host before she realized she preferred whatever ambiguity the wife of Pete Tyler could afford.

She visited Pete Tyler's grave at the base of the garden every day. The headstone had only been placed two months previously, and when she'd been able, Jackie walked down the gravel path that wound through the rose garden, past Donald's pond and into the secluded corner where they'd laid Pete to rest. There was a bench there, and she would sit and talk to him for hours, about everything, about nothing, about her life with him, and her life with her other him.

To Jackie, it didn't matter that this Pete hadn't met her until those last hours at Canary Wharf. Perhaps, she thought, her first and second Petes were waiting in the same heaven for her to join them. She liked to think so. Despite the small inkling in the back of her mind that death without Rose nearby was impossible, the idea that her Petes waited for her together was the only hope she really had of seeing her daughter again.

The sound of Jackie's bedroom door opening woke her up, and for a moment Jackie was surprised she'd fallen asleep again. She blinked in the sunlit room, wondering why she hadn't woken to her mobile ringing. Rose called every morning, just as dawn broke, and it was clearly past that time now.

"Morning, Mum," said Donald as he carried the breakfast tray into the room and set it on the dresser. Jackie watched as her son pushed back the curtains. Perhaps she hadn't really woken in the middle of the night, unable to fall asleep again. "The storm's blown away – you should smell the grass. Did the storm wake you?"

"My mobile didn't ring," said Jackie. "Donald, check my mobile."

Donald tied back the curtains and leaned over to glance at the mobile. "No, doesn't look like you missed any calls. Let's get you up for breakfast, all right?" He expertly slid an arm under his mother's shoulders and helped her sit up, rearranging the pillows behind her and pulling the blankets up over her lap. When Jackie was settled, he brought the tray and set it over her lap.

"Are you sure no one's rung?"

"Yes, Mum," said Donald patiently. "Make sure you eat everything."

Jackie eyed the food. "I thought I wasn't allowed eggs."

"Today's special, and I'm thinking the extra protein will give you some more strength. Call it doctor's orders." Donald collapsed onto a nearby chair and propped his feet on the bed, grinning at her. He was handsome, her son, blue eyes, close-cropped hair, and an affinity for dark leather jackets. He looked a little like Pete Tyler, really, and someone Jackie didn't remember very well. All the same, when Jackie had learned that Donald intended to study medicine at university, she had laughed herself silly.

"What's special about today?" Jackie picked up the spoon, nearly dropped it again, and clutched it harder on the second go.

"Surprise."

"I haven't forgotten a birthday?"

"Not one I know about. Are you going to eat your toast?"

Donald asked it every morning, and just like every morning, Jackie replied, "No." He nicked the triangles from her tray and began to munch happily. The morning fell into its typical routine while he told her the gruesome tales from the emergency ward's night shift. Jackie listened to her son talk, not paying terribly close attention, so she almost missed it when he began describing one of the patients.

"…we're pretty sure it's a trick, of course – something to do with a slipped pacemaker, maybe. Jones called it an advancement in the evolutionary process, but what does Jones know, she's practically senile anyway."

"What's a trick?" asked Jackie, confused.

Donald popped the last bit of toast into his mouth. "Double heartbeat. Double hearts. Oddest thing, listening to it. You listen to one side of the chest, and boom boom boom, and the other side of the chest, you get boom boom boom. They were carting her off for X-rays when I was coming home, so I suppose I'll find out tomorrow what was going on, but there's a pool now, if it's evolution like Jones says or just an echo."

Jackie laid down her spoon, her own heart beating wildly. "Two hearts?"

"Thought we would have known about a body with two hearts before now. You have to think it would be written up in all the journals out there. How was your egg?"

Jackie looked down at her tray to discover the egg still sitting there, untouched. "What's her name?"

Donald frowned. "You know I can't tell you that, Mum. Doctor patient confidentiality. And anyway, I don't know it, I wasn't the attending and I was on my way out the door."

"But you saw her?"

"A glimpse yeah – you tellin' me you know a girl with two hearts, Mum?"

"Of course not, but—"

Somewhere below them, the doorbell rang, and Donald swung his feet off the bed. "That'll be the day nurse; eat your egg, Mum, I'm going to let her in."

Jackie tapped the hard-boiled egg with her fork, before slicing it neatly in two. Two bright yellow eyes looked back at her as the egg wobbled a little on the plate, perfect round circles, perfectly paired.

A pair of yolks, a pair of hearts.

Jackie set her fork down, unable to eat a bite, and waited for Donald to return with the nurse so that he could take the tray away.

* * *

The surprise arrived with lunch, shortly after noon. The mobile had remained deceptively quiet all morning, and Jackie was unable to concentrate on much of anything. The nurse, of course, noticed, and Jackie was sure something was said to Donald outside of her hearing, but she couldn't be bothered about it. Rose was not ringing, and Rose had rung every morning at dawn like clockwork for several years.

"Hello, Mum!" said Jackie's surprise cheerfully, carrying in the lunch tray, and Jackie looked up from her quiet mobile to see her younger daughter, Molly, at the foot of the bed.

"Molly," breathed Jackie, almost forgetting the mobile in her lap. "But you're in India!"

"Not in the last five days," Molly said, setting the tray down on the floor. She crawled up from the foot of the bed to give her mother a hug. "Zeppelins take _such_ a long time. Oof, you're thin. Doesn't Donald feed you?"

"Why are you here?" scolded Jackie. "You're not supposed to be home for another four months."

"Oh, got tired of India. A whole country without hamburgers, I don't know how anyone can stand it. Donald stood me for the ticket and here I am." Molly gave her mother a squeeze. "What do you think? Lovely surprise?"

"Very. Only, you didn't _need_ to come home."

"Course not," said Molly evenly, and she hopped off the bed to fetch the lunch tray. "Ugh, soup and toast. No wonder you're so thin. I've been craving steak like mad."

"When did you get in?"

"Oh, a few hours ago. Gavin's going to take me for tea, d'you suppose he'll be all right if tea consists of beef?"

"Let me look at you," said Jackie, and Molly set the tray down again, grinning at her mother.

"I'm a mess, haven't even showered for days," she declared, but waited for her inspection anyway. Her dark blonde hair was cropped short and curly, and her brown eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. There was something else there, too, Jackie noted – Molly was hiding something in her eyes, in the easy way she turned in circles for her mother's assessment. Molly moved quickly, always running from one place to the other. Now she seemed at rest, patient almost, calm and serene. At least, calm and serene as far as knee-high lace-up boots, denim skirt and purple zip-up sweatshirt with ragged patches could allow.

"Mum," said Molly after a minute. "You're staring."

"You look lovely."

"Do not," said Molly, pleased. "Let's toss your soup out the window, and I'll sneak you out past Nurse Ratched and we'll find something more palatable."

"Soup will do me very nicely."

"Suit yourself." Molly set the tray over her mother's lap. "I should have brought grapes."

"Tell me about India."

"Oh, I hate that. I never know how to begin."

"All right. Tell me what time it is in India and what you'd be doing right now if you were there."

Molly grinned and fell back onto the bed to answer without a moment's hesitation. "Right now? Curry with Kirti and Mike…." Molly was off like a rocket, talking Jackie through her evening plans, and Jackie let her daughter's voice wash over her without paying much attention to the words. It wasn't that she didn't care about Molly's experiences, but that they were so foreign and unusual, Jackie didn't feel she had any sort of reference for them. Rose had been the same, coming back from some journey with the Doctor, holding some trinket in her hand and full of unusual stories, none of which made much sense to Jackie.

Molly's sudden reappearance ought to have been a happy event; instead, it merely reminded Jackie that her mobile had been silent all morning.

"Mum? Are you listening?"

"Of course I'm listening," said Jackie. "How long are you staying?"

Molly shrugged. "Oh, I don't know. Three weeks, four." Her daughter's lazy grin was almost infectious. "I might never go away again, how's that, Mum?"

"You stay put? Never," said Jackie. "Tell me more about the curry in India." As soon as Molly was off again, Jackie closed her eyes. There was little doubt in her mind what Donald had said to his wayward, wanderlusting sister to make her come home.

The next visitor was Mickey Smith, and Jackie wasted no time in shooing everyone else out of the room.

"Mickey Smith," demanded Jackie, looking him straight in the eye. "What have you done with the blue box?"

Mickey stared at Jackie for a moment, not comprehending. "What are you talking about, Jackie?"

"The one at Torchwood, the one you're keeping safe for Rose. What did you do to it?"

Mickey sat heavily on the chair next to the bed. "Nothing, Jackie, nothing! I saw it two days ago, it's fine. There's so many safety combinations on that room, even I can't get in without my own authorization."

Jackie settled back on her pillow and nodded her head at the still silent mobile on the bedside table. "Rose didn't ring this morning."

Mickey frowned and reached for the mobile. "Let me see it." She handed it to him, and he flipped it open. He pressed the buttons as if looking for something, flipped it over to check the battery, and then pressed a few more buttons. After a moment, the mobile in his pocket began to ring.

"Well, your mobile is dialing out," he said finally. "The history on it shows no incoming call this morning, so you haven't missed one. It also shows the incoming calls from the previous two weeks. All very regular, every morning near 5:30." Mickey frowned, looking up at Jackie. "Odd that she'd have the timing so exact, isn't it, when the flow still shifts one way or the other?"

"Perhaps it's stabilized."

"I'm not so sure," said Mickey, but didn't elaborate. "Perhaps something happened to the crossroads on their end?"

Jackie's heart thudded. "Mickey."

Mickey dug into his pocket for his phone. "He gave me a number, once – the Doctor did, I mean. Said to ring him if I ever thought—" He glanced up at Jackie, briefly, before flipping his phone open and beginning to hit the numbers with his thumb. "I'll try ringing through, and see if he answers."

"No. Not until…Mickey," said Jackie. "There's a woman at hospital, Donald told me about her. She has two hearts."

Mickey paused before hitting the last number. "Two hearts?"

"Donald didn't catch her name. He doesn't know anything about her, really, he was heading home when she was being examined. Only – two hearts, Mickey. I've never heard of anyone having two hearts, except for the Doctor."

Mickey flipped the phone shut. He stared at Jackie as if he'd never seen her before in his life. "I should go talk to her."

"Why do you think I told you?"

Mickey swallowed. "You don't think—"

"I don't know what to think."

"Another Time Lord?"

Jackie closed her eyes and leaned her head back. "Just tell me what she says."


	3. Chapter 3

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Three: Dex, Dragons, and Panyards**... It never fails – when one wanders from the Tardis, one winds up taken into custody by the local constabulary.

* * *

**Chapter Three: Dex, Dragons, and Panyards**

Rose woke to the soft voice of her son, and opened her eyes to see a pair of brown eyes and a short nose resting on the edge of the mattress. This further muffled his voice, softly repeating, "Mummy?" over and over. It was a bit like a broken record, like another little boy calling for his mother in the midst of a German bombing campaign.

It almost worried her, waking to that memory, except it was tempered now by both time and experience. Rose felt a kinship with lost little Jamie, who'd been fixed by the nanogenes and returned to his mother, much as Rose had been fixed by the nanogenes and returned to the Doctor. Jamie had been lost and lonely, which the little boy at Rose's bedside most decidedly was not. Dex was worried, of course, and a little bit fearful, but the cool green glow that accompanied his thoughts and knocked at Rose's silvery-turquoise consciousness had an impatient and hopeful feeling about it, as if it was completely confident that Mummy could fix anything.

As soon as Rose's eyes opened, Dex fell quiet, brown eyes wide. They looked at each other for a moment, Rose slowly waking up, and Dex slowly realizing that his mother had finally woken.

"Mummy," he whispered one last time. "Why're you and Dad naked? You're not making another baby, are you?"

Rose's hearts nearly stopped before she realized that she and the Doctor were, indeed, covered by the blankets she'd managed to grab shortly before they had fallen asleep. How her son knew they were both naked despite this, Rose didn't know and didn't think she _wanted_ to know. She almost wished they'd remembered to lock the door behind them, but despite his bravado, she could tell from the green throb of Dex's thoughts that he was distressed on some level that had nothing to do with his parents' state of dress, so it was probably just as well the door was unlocked.

"Dex," she whispered. "Go out into the corridor, sweetheart. I'll be there in a tic."

Dex's nose dropped down from the mattress as he scampered out of the room and slipped into the corridor. Rose breathed a sigh of relief, and assessed her situation. The Doctor snored softly behind her, his arm gripping her waist possessively. Carefully, having had years of practice, she rolled just a bit closer to him, and he rolled onto his back, freeing her. She quickly moved out from under the covers, sliding her pillow down so that as he rolled back to slide his arm over her again, he cuddled her pillow. She watched as he frowned in his sleep, but when he didn't immediately wake, Rose knew she'd have at least twenty minutes before he realized he'd been tricked.

Rose tossed on her clothes and hurried out to find her son sitting patiently in the corridor. She pulled on her shoes while the explanation flowed out of Dex as if he'd been holding back a tornado.

"I only wanted to see them, and if they were like Dad said, I didn't mean to really do anything bad, only I told Aunt Sarah Jane I could but I don't think she believed me but I can and I did and now the TARDIS is upset with me and I don't know why because I'll bet you never felt a thing and she won't even open the doors and I want to see if I landed us right."

"_Breathe_, Dex," said Rose automatically.

"Why?"

"Because if you rely on your bypass respiratory system too much, you won't be able to use it when you really need it. And because I asked you." Dex inhaled sharply, and Rose knelt in front of him. He was trembling, but it was hard to tell if it was fear or indignation. There was a dark bruise forming on his cheek, and Rose ran her thumb over it with a frown. Dex winced.

"What caused this?"

"I fell when we landed," said Dex. "Mummy, the TARDIS won't open the doors."

"Of course the TARDIS won't open the doors," said Rose kindly. "You know she won't unless Dad or me are there with you. Besides, we aren't anywhere for them to open, we're orbiting Kaspa." Rose paused while Dex's words sunk in. "What do you mean, _landed_?"

"I took us somewhere!"

Rose gave her son what she hoped was a Do Not Exaggerate To Your Mother look.

"Mum, I _did_."

"All right, where?"

"To see the Panyards."

"Who?"

"Dad talks about them, they're awful, he says, they eat little boys and sail like pirates and I wanted to see one."

Rose sighed. "I knew telling you physics as bedtime stories was a bad idea."

"It's not physics, Mummy, it's real," insisted Dex, without any thought to logic whatsoever. "Panyards live in Lezzabethengland and I told the TARDIS to take us there and she _did_."

Rose stared at her son for a moment, trying desperately not to laugh. "Dex. Do you mean the Spaniards in Elizabethan England?"

"That's what I _said_!"

Rose's voice began to rise. "You had the TARDIS move us from orbit, into the Time Vortex, and all the way back to Elizabethan England? _Without either of your parents nearby_?"

Dex swallowed. "Yep."

Rose rubbed her temples for a moment, wondering how she had produced an exact replica of the Doctor, only shorter. Yelling at the Doctor never worked. Yelling at Dex just made her feel like a heel. Rose stood up. "Well, allons-y, then," she said, with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. "We'd best take a look, don't you think?"

Dex grinned wildly at his mother. "I'm not in trouble?"

"Oh, you're in trouble. But we've got fifteen minutes before your father wakes up, we might as well make the most of it."

Dex whooped and grabbed his mother's hand to pull her down the corridor and into the console room. The TARDIS continued to hum disapprovingly, and Rose glanced at the crack in the strut as she passed. It didn't seem to be any worse than it had been that morning, but the TARDIS didn't so much as squeak as she passed it, which struck Rose as unusual. For the past week, the TARDIS had let out a series of beeps and whistles when anyone passed the damaged strut; now the console room remained silent, save for the hum.

Rose half expected to see a line of guards outside the TARDIS's doors, all waiting to take the Doctor's head. Instead, she found nothing but a lonely, thick forest, smelling strongly of damp bark and wet grass. The air was heavy and there was a low mist along the ground; it smelled of rain and damp dirt, and Rose wished she'd thought to find them both cloaks or coats or something to wear over their shoulders, because the chill in the air made even her cold-blooded son shiver. Rose pulled him a little closer, but Dex was fascinated by his surroundings and wasn't distracted in the least.

"Mummy," he said, his voice filled with delight, "are we in Sherwood Forest?"

Rose grinned, pleased that something existed in her son's head other than temporal physics and pirating Panyards. Besides, the idea of somewhere new to explore – and they hadn't explored anything new in _months_ – appealed to her immensely. "Do you hear Robin Hood?"

"Maybe." Dex began pulling his mother into the trees, so anxious to explore that he slipped on the wet leaves beneath his feet. "Do Panyards live in Sherwood Forest, too?"

"_Spaniards_," corrected Rose, and she glanced back at the TARDIS. "We ought to find something warmer to wear if we're going to go exploring."

Dex broke into a grin. "_Can_ we go exploring? I won't get lost, I'm not cold, can we go now, please? Before Dad wakes up?"

"You're still in trouble for running the TARDIS without either of us there," Rose reminded her son, and he nodded, a bit too enthusiastic.

"Oh, I know that, but Dad won't let me explore once he knows I'm in trouble. Can we look around a little bit, first? Please? I won't tell Dad, promise!"

"I'm not supposed to be the good cop," muttered Rose as she let Dex pull her further into the woods. "You have your father wrapped around your little finger already."

"Do you think the dragons live here, too?" asked Dex, kicking up leaves as he walked.

"Dragons?"

"I want to catch one and show it to Aunt Sarah Jane."

"I don't think there are any dragons, Dex," said Rose.

"Dad said there were."

"Not on Earth, sweetheart."

Dex stopped in his tracks and stared at his mother. "We're on _Earth_?" he moaned, and Rose picked him up for a hug.

"Oh, Dex, where did you think Elizabethan England _was_?"

"Somewhere with _dragons_!" wailed the little boy, and Rose kissed his cheek.

"You know England is on Earth, that's where Mummy's from," she chided her son gently, and set him back down on his feet. "Now, you can lift up your chin and help me explore, or we can go right back to the TARDIS and explain to your father what you did."

Dex let out a most disgusted sigh and began walking through the trees again. "I thought there'd be _dragons_."

"Next time Dad asks where we want to go, I'll ask for dragons," Rose promised him, ruffling his hair, and Dex stepped out of the way.

"He'll know you're asking for me."

"Who said I'd ask for you? I like dragons."

"Why'd Dad say there were dragons in Lezzabethangland, anyway, if there aren't any dragons?" demanded Dex.

"He didn't want to come here," explained Rose, holding some of the brush out of their way. "He hasn't had very good experiences when he's landed in this time."

"Like what?"

"Well, the first time, he was with Aunt Martha, and one of his hearts stopped beating, and she had to start it up again. And the next time was before you were born, and I was kidnapped by Spaniards, and he and Aunt Martha had to rescue me."

Dex stared at his mother with something between awe and envy on his face. "You were kidnapped? By Panyards?"

"Spaniards, Dex. Yes."

"Did they split you in two and eat you up like a baked potato?"

Rose stared at her son. "What is your father telling you before bed? Because it isn't temporal physics."

"_Did_ they?"

"No!"

Dex sighed. "Are there Panyards in Sherwood Forest?"

"No!"

"Then what's the point of _being_ here?"

Rose was about to pick up her wayward son and drag him back to the TARDIS to start off his punishment when she heard the snap of breaking wood behind them. She froze, resting her hand on Dex's shoulder. Rose had never gotten the hang of using words with telepathy, but she knew enough to give her son the sense of _staying still_ and _being quiet_, and Dex immediately obeyed, looking up at his mother with wide eyes.

"Who's there?" she called out, trying to make herself sound brave and important. She glanced behind her, and saw a man step through the trees. Carefully she turned to face him head-on, and held Dex just behind her.

"Who are you?" she snapped, determined to make a good show despite the odd situation.

He was tall, with blond hair and beard. He wore dark brown hose with black breeches, and a tan doublet on which was embroidered the shadow of a royal seal in dark brown. Rose could see bits of the white shirt he wore underneath the doublet at his neck and wrist, but his arms were covered by the thick black cloak that swirled around him. He wore a shiny metal helmet, and in his arms, pointed directly at her, was a long musket.

Rose could feel Dex tremble behind her, and she remembered exactly _why_ they'd stopped exploring new places for a while; Bad Things had a tendency to occur. Dex's fear pushed so strongly against her own, she could barely stand up straight. She held him closer to her, willing him silently to trust her.

"I am the captain of Her Majesty, Queen Mary's Royal Guard, madame, and you are under arrest for trespassing."

"Trespassing?" echoed Rose. "I saw no sign posted claiming these as private grounds."

The captain snorted. "Then you are not from here. You will come with me."

"I will do no such thing," said Rose hotly. "My son and I were heading home, and that's where I intend to go."

She took a step forward, but around them, several more guards appeared, each holding a musket, each with a doublet emblazoned with what had to be Mary's seal. Rose stopped again, looking more closely at the seal on the doublet. If Mary was queen, then Dex had brought them to a point in history well before the Doctor had met Elizabeth – hopefully. It meant he was still safe. It meant he might be able to help them.

"Name yourself, woman."

Rose thought she might as well use the title another queen had given her. "I am Lady Rose Tyler of the Powell Estate," she said as stiffly as she could manage. "This is my son. I insist you allow us to pass."

The captain lowered his musket, and tipped his head at her respectfully. "Lady, I beg your pardon, but I cannot. I am under orders to bring all who wander here to Hatfield House. Once there, if what you say is true, your freedom can be obtained."

Dex trembled again, but Rose didn't think it was fear. The little boy shifted from foot to foot; he was practically bouncing. "Are we prisoners then?"

"No, lady," said the captain, almost smiling. "Honored guests – with an escort."

Rose wasn't sure one rolled their eyes in Elizabethan England, but she did it anyway. The Doctor still slept, Dex tugged at her jumper, and her canvas trainers were soaked through.

"I will come with you," said Rose carefully. "Provided you tell me where it is we go."

"Hatfield House is two miles south. If you walk quickly, we will be there in but half an hour."

Rose glanced back to where the TARDIS waited; she couldn't even see the blue paint shining through the trees. "Lead on, then."

The captain was good enough to hold back the worst of the branches as Rose and Dex walked. On the whole, though, he and the rest of the guards did not seem to pay much attention to either of them, talking amongst themselves and every so often letting out a barking laugh.

"Mummy?" Dex sounded entirely too excited, considering they were being marched toward imprisonment.

"Yes, Dex?"

"Dad won't think we've been eaten by Panyards, will he?"

"I doubt it."

"_Are_ we going to be eaten by Panyards?"

"I hope not."

"Okay. Because I still want to find a dragon for Aunt Sarah Jane."

Rose began to laugh. The guards surrounding them glanced at her, but she didn't care in the slightest. "Don't worry, Dex. If there's a dragon at Hatfield House, I'm sure he'll be more than happy to meet Sarah Jane."

"Good." Satisfied, Dex squeezed her hand once, and then jogged up ahead to the captain, beginning to pepper him with questions Rose could only dimly overhear. She was able to pick up on dragons, and the use of a musket, and before long, her son had charmed the guard into describing every tree and plant as they passed by.

Rose grinned, despite herself. Leave it to her son to find the joy and excitement in anything, from being presented with a baby sister instead of the pint-size TARDIS he'd requested, to being marched toward their possible execution. She could feel the tension and fear leaving Dex's thoughts, melting into the comfortable rhythms of a fascinated young boy, and Rose gently slipped back out of them, settling herself in her own concerned mind. The Doctor was still asleep, as was Nina, else she would have known it. The TARDIS hadn't gone anywhere, because the key which hung around her neck beneath her jumper was still faintly warm. The superwatch was securely strapped to her wrist, with the built-in locater function that connected to the Doctor's cellular modifier. For now, she and Dex were safe.

Rose rested her eyes on Dex and the captain, and wondered what they would find at Hatfield House.


	4. Chapter 4

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Four: The Not-Yet Queen**... Being captured is quite a lot of fun when you're four years old. When you're the four-year-old's mother, it's not so entertaining, particularly when your captor is a woman who wants to chop off your rescuer's head.

* * *

**Chapter Four: The Not-Yet Queen**

Hatfield House reminded Rose of the sweeping BBC costume dramas Jackie had watched when Rose was a girl. It wasn't even properly a house, it was an entire estate – the brown brick building went on for miles in either direction, surrounded by pristine garden and sweeping green lawns. Dark clouds hovered low in the air, and every window curtained and closed. Even Dex was impressed, stopping in his tracks to let his mother catch up to him, silent as he took it all in.

Being Dex, he didn't remain silent for long. "Mummy, the captain says there aren't any dragons, but he has a stallion and he might let me ride it if the princess says I can."

"Stallions are very big, Dex, and you're still little."

"I know, but I can hold on tight. Do you think the princess is a Panyard?"

"I don't think there are any Panyards about right now, Dex. It might not be a good idea to talk about them very much."

"Will it mess up time lines?"

At least something the Doctor had told Dex was useful to her now. "Very much so."

"All right." The little boy reached up and took Rose's hand, gripping it tightly. "Is it always this exciting, Mummy? Gettin' captured and tossed in a prison and having Dad come rescue us? I don't think I've ever been captured before."

"Not that you'd remember, anyway," said Rose, almost amused.

"How long will it be before Dad rescues us?"

"Oh, he'll have to wake up first. I'm a bit surprised he hasn't already."

"He hasn't slept in six days," reported Dex gleefully, and if they hadn't been surrounded by guards, Rose might have stopped dead in her tracks.

"Six days? Why didn't he say something?"

"I dunno. But I heard him thinking that something funny was coming."

"Don't read your father's thoughts without permission," Rose scolded, but her heart wasn't in it. She really would rather Dex had simply told her more.

They were approaching the house now; a woman appeared at the door, wearing a livery of dark clothes under a gleaming white apron. She frowned at the group, and Dex began to skip with excitement.

"Is she our gaoler?" he whispered, tugging on Rose's arm.

"Hush, Dex."

"Who is this, then?" the woman asked the captain, glancing at Rose and Dex.

"Lady Rose Tyler of the Powell Estates, and her son. We found them in the forest, about two miles north."

"They look odd enough."

"They claim no knowledge of the forest. I believe they mean no harm, and the queen's last orders were to bring anyone we found directly to justice."

"Justice here is the princess."

"So it is," countered the captain in a tone that brokered no argument. "Do not concern yourself, housekeeper. They will not harm the child."

It was an odd thing to say, Rose thought, and glanced at the woman nervously. The words seemed to comfort the serving woman, however, who let out a breath in relief. "You are certain? No harm can come to the baby."

"I would not bring it." The woman nodded sharply, and fixed her eyes on Rose, who gripped Dex's hand a little tighter. The captain turned to them, and gave the boy a slight smile. "I leave you here, lady. Boy, take care of your mother."

"Yes sir," said Dex, eyes widening as the man clapped a hand down on his shoulder before stalking away with the rest of the guards. The woman at the door sniffed, and motioned them inside.

It was not much warmer in the house, but at least it was dry and free of the mist that clung to Rose's skin. The woman did not say a word to either of them, but began walking briskly down the wide hallway, expecting them both to follow. Their footsteps echoed in the massive space, and Rose was able to glimpse her reflection in the mirrors that lined the hall. She gulped, no longer wondering that they didn't think much of her, as her hair was a mess, filled with leaves and tangles, and there were smudges on her cheeks from the branches she hadn't been able to avoid.

It was odd that the guards had left them almost entirely alone now, after having been escorted to the door. Rose half thought that if she and Dex had truly wanted to run away, they could have slipped right back outside again without any trouble, but curiosity to learn what was going on kept her moving. If Rose ran, she had no doubt that the guards would find her again quite easily, since they clearly had motivation, and a queen's orders at their backs.

The woman led them up a back staircase, tight and steep, and Rose had to help Dex climb up. The woman waited for them at the top of the stairs, arms folded and stern face impatient.

"The boy is yours?" she asked briskly, and Rose glanced up at her in the slightly annoyed way of overworked and under-assisted mothers.

"Yes. He's three."

"Four," corrected Dex. "Almost."

The woman's expression didn't change; she simply turned and continued walking down the hallway. Rose looked at Dex and smiled, hoping to give the boy courage, but he didn't need it – he nearly glowed with excitement, bouncing from foot to foot, and Rose decided to stop all adventure stories before bed. Heaven help her if Dex decided to go _looking_ for trouble.

The woman stopped before a door nearly at the end of the hall and opened it, leading Rose and Dex inside. The room was large and ornate, with a curtained bed on the far side and a fireplace on one wall. A fire was already lit; the room was comfortably warm after the chill of the forest, although the colors of the room made Rose think they'd never actually left. The walls were dark green, the rug was green, there were green curtains on the windows and bed. Rose supposed she ought to be thankful it wasn't pink.

The room was even furnished well; there were chairs near the fire, which crackled and filled the room with the warm scents of wood-smoke and cedar. A wardrobe in the corner caught Dex's attention immediately, and near it stood a washbasin, steam rising from what was surely a pitcher of hot water waiting for them. Mirrors and paintings lined the walls, and Rose thought it was probably the nicest prison she'd ever seen.

"You will find water in the basins for washing up," said the woman briskly. "I am the housekeeper here, you may call me Mrs. Casborne."

"I'm Dex," said the boy. "I'm four."

Mrs. Casborne was unfazed. "Welcome to Hatfield House, Lady Rose, Master Dex. Someone will see to you shortly."

"Thank you," said Rose, but before the words were completely out of her mouth, Mrs. Casborne had already closed the door. Rose could hear a lock click, and she shook her head – there might have been a fire and a curtained bed, but it was a prison all the same.

Dex was already busy with the task of exploring, looking under the bed and behind the large wardrobe in the corner. "I think I like prison."

"Don't get used to it," advised Rose, going straight to the fire to warm her hands. She remembered another ornate fireplace several galaxies away, and half wondered if she would see another version of the Doctor looking through the flames from the other side, but _that_ was more ridiculous than anything else which had happened so far.

"Mummy," called Dex. "There's clothes in here!"

"Good, you're a mess. Take off what you've got and I'll give you a bath."

"I don't need a bath!"

"Overruled," said Rose, and went to join her son by the wardrobe, briskly pulling off his shirt. "You're absolutely filthy, and I have an idea that someone will be coming by shortly to interview us. If you look respectable, they might not feed you to the Panyards."

"You said there weren't any Panyards," sulked Dex, kicking off his shoes.

"I suspect they'd find one just for you." Sure enough, there was hot water in the pitcher, and Rose poured it into the basin to cool a bit. She opened the cupboard below the basin and found a stack of clean white cloths. "Arms up, Dex."

Dex lifted his arms and stared as his mother dropped the cloth in the water and wrung it out again. "That's not a bath!"

"It is for now," said Rose, kneeling down to run the cloth over her son's body. "This is how people bathed in Elizabethan England. Or maybe they didn't bathe – I think I remember reading that somewhere. Everyone thought that if you bathed too often, you'd take sick and die. Turn, please."

He turned. "That's silly. Why would being clean make you die?"

"I don't know, it's just what they thought. Goodness, Dex, did you roll around in the mud when I wasn't looking?"

"Yes," said Dex, just to be contrary, and Rose tugged at his hair gently, making him giggle. He turned around again. "Are you going to wash too? Your hair's a mess."

Rose sighed; one day, she'd have to teach her children tact, since their father certainly wasn't going to do it. "Thank you, Dex. I can't exactly wash my hair, but I suspect there's a brush around here somewhere. Why don't you wash your feet and I'll go find something for you to wear?"

Dex took the cloth and sat on the floor, running it between his toes like floss. Rose opened the wardrobe doors to find several piles of dresses waiting and a row of shirts hanging from above. She rummaged a little more before finding a smallish shirt and dark blue breeches for her son. There was a mulberry-colored doublet, and well as something that might have been underwear and very long, thick socks, and she supposed this would do.

"Here we go," she said, putting it next to the boy. "You'll be a right smart little gentleman in these." She reached for one of the towels in the washbasin cupboard and began drying Dex off. "Can you manage to dress yourself while I clean up?"

"I'm _four_," Dex reminded her, although he gave no indication whether or not that meant he could or could not handle such a task unsupervised. Rose decided he'd shout for help eventually. She draped the towel over his head and left him to it, returning to the wash basin to clean off her hands and face while Dex inspected the pile of clothing.

"I'm not wearing stockings."

"They're not stockings, they're socks."

"They look like they should go on Nina."

"Doesn't matter, put them on anyway." The hot water on her neck was marvelous; Rose wondered if the housekeeper would throw a fit if she asked for a full bath.

"Are you sure this isn't a skirt?"

"They're breeches, and they're very wide. Put them on."

Rose turned back to the wardrobe and pulled out a fairly simple full blue skirt and white blouse; there was also a matching brocade vest-like bodice to go over it. Thankful to find something she could put on without assistance, Rose changed into the clothing. It didn't fit quite right, but it was close, and there were ties to pull things tighter as needed. She turned to see Dex struggling with the doublet and laughed.

"Here, let me help." She knelt before him and began tying the front closed. "What do you think? Do we look respectable now?"

"There's a baby in the house," said Dex.

Rose paused, remembering the odd words between the guard and the housekeeper before. "You're right, they did say something about a baby, didn't they?"

"I can hear her in my head, like I talk to Dad. She's got pretty thoughts, like peaches."

Rose shook her head and finished tying Dex's doublet. "Honestly, Dex."

"It's _true_," insisted Dex, and the click of the lock in the door caught their attention for a moment. Rose hastily stood up on rested her hand on her son's head.

Mrs. Casborne appeared in the opened doorway. "Lady Rose, the princess is ready to receive you. The boy may come as well."

It was as the woman led then down the corridor that Rose felt familiar purple thoughts slip into her mind, as if their owner walked along side her, hands in pockets, worried but relieved, grinning a familiar grin.

"Dad!" whispered Dex excitedly, feeling it too, and Rose squeezed his hand tightly to remind him to be quiet.

There were never words, as such, when Rose and the Doctor let their thoughts overlap. Her telepathy wasn't strong enough, but for some reason, pictures sailed through perfectly well. The Doctor showed her images from when he'd woken up with a pillow and not a Rose, the TARDIS humming but incapable of anything else, and the time chronometer giving a reading of May, 1558.

Rose had done her homework on Elizabeth in the intervening years, knowing they'd land there eventually. In May of 1558, Elizabeth was not yet queen; Mary had died late in the year. The captain had mentioned a princess – and Rose had a very good idea who the princess might be. She didn't think they were in trouble – not yet, anyway, but all the same, it was good to know where Dex had landed them – oops.

Dex's hand gripped her tightly, and she could feel his wince as the Doctor began to shout across the line. Rose had no doubt that Dex could hear the words perfectly, even if she could not, and she had very little doubt that the Doctor was not one bit pleased with their son. Quick as she could, she sent over a slightly exaggerated image of the royal guard, muskets drawn, and beside her, Dex relaxed just a bit.

The Doctor was silent for a moment; Rose thought she might have startled him into a coma. Dex had never been really in danger before; she supposed that despite the lifestyle, the Doctor hadn't really entertained the notion that his children might ever be threatened. Rose thought about being safe as hard as she could, and it was another minute before she felt a mental hug of apology and relief from the Doctor.

"He'll save us," Dex whispered to Rose confidently. Rose nodded, trying not to let tears prick her eyes, and she held onto the Doctor's thoughts, suddenly very unwilling to let them go just yet. The Doctor didn't seem to mind a bit; she watched him wrap Nina up warmly before shrugging on his own trench coat. The two of them headed out the TARDIS to begin the trek to Hatfield House. Rose found herself matching her steps with his, so they walked in tune together. Dex followed suit, and Rose gripped his small hand in hers, glad he was there, but all the same wishing it was the larger hand instead. By the time Mrs. Casborne had stopped in front of yet another door, Rose was full of strength and courage, and the strong pulse of her children and her Doctor sat like marbles in the back of her mind.

Mrs. Casborne gave them both a careful look. "You'll do well to remember your manners. You will call her _lady_ and you will explain yourself completely."

"Dex, be good," Rose told her son.

"I was referring to you, my lady," said the housekeeper, and Dex stifled a giggle. The Doctor seemed to giggle too; Dex was apparently relaying the conversation to him. Rose gave them both a mental shove as Mrs. Casborne opened the door and ushered them inside.

The room was sparsely decorated, with bare walls and bare wood floor. There were several settees and chairs circled around an open fireplace, currently ablaze and crackling, and in one of the wide chairs sat a ginger-haired woman who looked several years younger than Rose. She did not immediately look up at them; her gaze was focused on the cradle at her feet, which she was slowly rocking back and forth while humming a song just loud enough for Rose to hear. The woman stood up as Rose and Dex stepped closer, and her smile lit up her otherwise plain face into something that was nearly pretty.

"Mrs. Casborne, do you bring me guests?"

"Yes, ma'am."

The young woman motioned Rose and Dex to the chairs opposite her. "Please, there is no cause to remain standing. Mrs. Casborne will bring us refreshments. I would so like to speak with you awhile. Very few people visit me here any more, though more in recent days."

Rose held Dex's hand tightly and sat on the very edge of the chair. Dex, however, wiggled his hand out and scrambled up beside her, looking around the room curiously before turning his focus on the woman opposite him.

"Are you a Panyard?"

Rose groaned and closed her eyes, but the woman merely laughed in amusement.

"I don't know. What's a Panyard?"

"Oh, they're horrible, they eat little boys and run around playing pirates."

"I don't eat little boys," said the woman. "But I think it would be fun to be a pirate sometimes, don't you?"

"If I can have a parrot, maybe. What's your name?"

"Elizabeth," said the woman, and Rose almost felt relieved. Not a queen yet – perhaps she wouldn't want to chop off the Doctor's head. Immediately, anyway. "What's yours?"

"Dex, and this is my mummy, her name is Rose. But I think Elizabeth is prettier."

Elizabeth turned to Rose, the smile still on her face. "And now we have been introduced. Welcome to Hatfield House, Lady Rose Tyler of the Powell Estates. I have not heard of your land, but I pay little attention to politics these days. I trust you were treated well by my sister's guards?"

"Yes, lady."

Dex bounced on the seat beside Rose, anxious to rejoin the conversation. "My sister's name is Nina. Dad let me pick it."

Elizabeth turned her gaze back to the boy, her eyes twinkling merrily. "That was kind of him."

"He said it was Nina or Disestablishmentarianism."

Rose closed her eyes and waited for Elizabeth to call for the guards. She sensed the Doctor on the other end of the link holding his breath. Rose loved her son, but she couldn't help but think he was a little sneak right then – Disestablishmentarianism hadn't even been on the short list. The real debate was whether or not the baby would be called Carissa, after the woman the Doctor had loved on Gallifrey so many centuries before.

"My sister is called Mary," said Elizabeth.

"That's a nice name, too," agreed Dex.

Rose opened her eyes again. Elizabeth smiled directly at her. "Very clever, your son."

"Oh, he is," agreed Rose, trying to decide how best to teach Dex not to be so clever.

"A handsome little fellow, as well. You must be proud of him."

"Yes, of course."

Dex puffed up a little. "What's your daughter's name?"

Elizabeth's face broke into a wide grin; the sun might have risen full force from behind her eyes. She glowed with something Rose thought she recognized as the same love and comforting joy the Doctor had whenever he looked at Dex or Nina. "Ah, would you like to see her?" asked Elizabeth, and she reached into the cradle to pull out a bundle wrapped in cotton and lace.

Rose's back stiffened; she could feel the Doctor through the link stiffen as well. Elizabeth had no children, not in any history Rose had read, not in any story anyone perceived to be historically accurate. "You have a daughter?" asked Rose cautiously, but Elizabeth did not pull her eyes away from the child.

"Isn't she lovely?" breathed Elizabeth. Dex jumped down from the chair, stepping up to Elizabeth's knee in order to better look at the baby. Elizabeth lowered the bundle enough to let the boy could see the baby's face. "Everyone in Hatfield House dotes upon her – the sun might rise and set every day but as long as she is happy, we do not notice. Tell me, Master Dex, do you think she's lovely?"

Rose could see the child now – she lay sleeping, her eyes framed by long lashes, one fist clenched beside her cheek. Her skin was nearly translucent, it was so pale, but the cheeks were plump. The mouth formed a perfect rose beneath a snub nose. Rose thought she caught a glimpse of ginger fuzz beneath the lacy cap the child had on its head, and Dex reached out a finger to stroke the baby's hand.

"Oh, yes," agreed Dex, captivated in a way he hadn't been even with his own sister. "Mummy, don't you think she's pretty?"

There was an odd sort of sensation pulling at Rose from her link with the Doctor; Rose didn't recognize it. It was almost as if he was trying to speak to her, but she'd never understood words through the link as well as the children. She wondered why he didn't simply talk to Dex. The boy continued to glow green near her, more brightly, in fact, as if buoyed by the adoration he was now clearly feeling for the child.

Something about the picture Elizabeth and Dex made seemed wrong to Rose, even if there hadn't been that niggling feeling from the Doctor. It was too sweet, the ginger-haired young princess with the perfect baby in her arms, a little boy peering in, curious and innocent. It reminded Rose of a wing at an art museum, full of paintings of Madonna and child, everyone plump and rosy, looking lovingly at each other and the world around them, figures glowing bright despite dark and grim backdrops.

"She's very sweet," said Rose finally. "What do you call her?"

Elizabeth looked up with dewy eyes, hazy and nearly clouded over with a strange glowing film. "Her name is Genevieve."

Rose could feel the sharp intake of breath from the Doctor – or perhaps it was her own. Elizabeth didn't seem to notice – in fact, she was leaning over now, as if to put the child in Rose's arms.

The images from the Doctor were coming fast and furious now – Rose could hardly tell what it was she was seeing. A church, a dull grey sky, her old Doctor in leather coat and black boots, incongruously holding a baby wrapped in a blanket. He was stern, that Doctor, angry with her, chiding her, telling her something she mustn't do….

It was too late. Elizabeth settled the baby in Rose's arms, and Rose looked down at the small, soft bundle. The child opened her blue eyes, waking from her sleep, and Rose caught her breath. Such blue eyes – deep and rich and so full of trust and innocence. Rose had never held anything quite so precious as this baby – nothing else could possibly deserve her love and attention.

The Doctor forgotten, the link severed, Rose whispered the only thing left on her mind: "Genevieve."


	5. Chapter 5

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Five: The Doctor and Genevieve**... The Doctor learns not to take Dex for granted. Not that he had before – but it's always a good lesson to remember.

* * *

**Chapter Five: The Doctor and Genevieve**

By the time the Doctor banged on the front door to Hatfield House, he had walked through five mud puddles, changed Nina's nappies four times, and stopped to give her a bottle once. He was exhausted, his shoes were caked in muck, and the only thing he really wanted to do was find Rose and Dex and haul them back to the TARDIS poste-haste, without so much as a cheerful "Allons-y".

"It's Rule Two," he told Nina, who was a little too quiet, but he was too upset to notice. "Not that they followed Rule One, you'll note, both of them just wandering off like that. Rule _Two_ would be not touching strange babies. What is it about women and babies? Your mother sees a baby, it's like a magnet, even if she brings Reapers down on her head. Ace sees a baby, she has to hold it, even if there are vampires at the door. And it was her mother, too – how we didn't all get eaten by Reapers, I'll never know. Stick a baby near a young woman, and they all instantly lose their heads."

Nina scrunched up her nose and gurgled.

"Oh, you, you're cute enough," acknowledged the Doctor, as though it was an extremely painful admission. "But I frankly don't see the attraction for anyone else."

Nina stuck her thumb in her mouth, frowning.

"I'm grounding them both," said the Doctor firmly, and Nina sighed. "I can ground Dex, anyway." Nina snorted. "I _am_ in charge of the TARDIS, you know. If I say Dex is grounded, Dex is grounded."

Nina rested her head on her father's shoulder and made mewing sounds, as if she was trying not to laugh. The Doctor sighed and patted her back, glaring at the door. Rose was somewhere behind it, he knew it. But try as he might, he couldn't touch her mind. The silvery-turquoise thoughts were there, but every time he tried to breach them, he slid back on a bed of oil.

He was about to start a fresh round of bangs on the door to Hatfield House when it opened, revealing a stout woman dressed in livery; her mouth was pursed and she looked wary and stern.

"You'll wake the baby," she scolded him, but the Doctor didn't care. Nina's head popped up instantly, her thumb still firmly in her mouth, and he felt her shudder just a bit in her arms. When he saw the strange film covering the woman's eyes, he thought he knew the reason why, and decided then and there that he'd destroy the lot of them if Rose and Dex weren't produced immediately.

"Bring me Rose and Dex Tyler," he ordered. "_Now_."

"Lady Rose Tyler is here," replied the woman. "Are you Sir Doctor of TARDIS?"

The Doctor blinked; he'd expected to have to bring out Queen Victoria's title himself, instead of having it presented to him. "Ah – yes."

The woman nodded and opened the door further. "Please come in," she said stiffly. "They have been waiting for you."

The Doctor shifted Nina as he stepped inside. Rescuing Rose and Dex was turning out to be much easier than expected. It didn't sit well. "Right. Thank you. You're not going to give me tea, are you? The last time someone said they'd give me tea, I was locked in a jail cell."

The woman stared at him blankly.

"Right then, no tea, just as well, no time for it anyway. Rose. Ah, please."

"Follow me." The woman turned sharply and led the Doctor and Nina through the darkened house. Nina rested her head on her father's shoulder, her eyes darting around the hall, and the Doctor rubbed her back, thinking hard. Nina's thoughts – pale pink and silver – were burrowing into his for comfort, and he thought he could almost hear her telepathic whimpers in the back of her mind. She'd been so quiet since Rose and Dex had stopped communicating; he wondered what worried her now. Eventually she would start speaking, his daughter – but until then, he still had to guess why she grew more agitated the closer they were to Rose.

The woman paused before a set of double doors and shoved them open, motioning the Doctor and Nina inside. The room was bright and cheerful, with a roaring fire in the fireplace and a thick rug on the hardwood floor. Windows lined the walls, every curtain tied back to allow in as much sunlight as possible, and laughter filled the air. The Doctor saw Rose and Dex on the floor in the center of the room, along with several other gaily dressed people, all focused on a small figure in the center, cradled in the lap of a young woman with ginger hair that flowed down her back.

Elizabeth. She looked up and met his eyes, and the laughter died on her lips.

The Doctor, for half a moment, was utterly convinced that he was about to breathe his last – Rose would be witness to another regeneration, once Elizabeth ordered his head off, and the children would have to get along with a new face on their father. He wondered if he oughtn't to set Nina down first; he had no doubt she'd be frightened, poor lamb. One doesn't see their dad burst into flame and turn into someone else every day, after all.

"Lady Rose," said Elizabeth gaily, breaking into the Doctor's plans. "Is this your Doctor?"

Rose turned and grinned when she saw him. "Oh, you're here!" she cried out happily. "I thought you'd never arrive." She ran over to him and kissed his cheek. "Goodness, but you're cold."

The Doctor swallowed and instinctively reached for her cheek. Her eyes had filmed over as well; he'd been hoping it wasn't so. Rose nuzzled into his hand and rested her hand over his, but there was no change in the slippery smooth silvery-turquoise thoughts dancing around his own. "Rose," he asked, his voice low. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," laughed Rose. "Hello, Nina, come give Mummy a kiss."

But Nina buried her face in the Doctor's shoulder, and hunched away from her mother, clearly unwilling to go. The Doctor pulled his hand from Rose's and rubbed circles on his daughter's back, feeling the child grow more anxious by the moment. The disappointment on Rose's face was unmistakable, and the Doctor wasn't sure that he shouldn't at least try to convince Nina that it was all right, but he felt the tiny fingers clench onto his lapels in response.

"Rose," he repeated. "Something's wrong. Did you touch the baby?"

"Genevieve? Of course – the princess let me give her a bottle, she's so lovely and sweet. Nina, don't you want to meet the baby? She's a darling, you'll make such good friends."

"Rose," pressed the Doctor, growing more angry. "I told you not to touch the baby. There's something wrong with it."

Rose tossed her head. "Nothing's wrong with the baby, don't be ridiculous."

"Dad!" yelled Dex, and suddenly the little boy was wrapped around the Doctor's legs, looking up with a wide grin. "Hello, Dad – you're here!"

The Doctor looked down to his son, not wanting to see the film over the familiar brown eyes – and he didn't. Though Dex's thoughts were as elusive as before, his son's eyes were crystal clear, bright and awake. The surprise was enough that he loosened his grip on Nina, giving Rose enough time to pull the child away. Nina screeched once, her eyes going as wide as saucers before Rose had bundled her away to the center of the room.

There were some points in his life when the Doctor had no control over time. Once, he'd watched Rose fall into the Void, seconds that lasted hours, screaming every minute of it until his throat was raw and his eyes were dry.

Once, he'd watched the Racnoss burn, fire and ash raining down on him for minutes that lasted days, coating everything in a dull red haze of loss and pain.

Now, he watched Rose carry Nina away, her silent plea for help burning into his mind as Rose's steps marked the time. Immobilized by Dex at his feet, the Doctor couldn't even reach out for her, snatch her back to the safety of his arms, and it was several years before he saw Rose set the child down in the center of the adults, all of whom looked on the baby Genevieve adoringly, encouraging the new child to greet the baby in the princess's lap.

"No," he said hoarsely, his throat as raw and dry as it'd been when he lost Rose at Canary Wharf. Nina looked back at her father, her eyes wide and her mouth trembling. She didn't see the baby in Elizabeth's lap turn its infant gaze to her; she didn't see the baby's eyes narrow in a way infant eyes should not. The baby Genevieve's arms flailed, and one hand lay squarely on Nina's hand and grasped for dear life.

Nina screamed, and time snapped back to attention. The scream snapped through the air, stopping time itself; not even the Doctor could move as he stared at his daughter in what was clearly the most intense pain she'd ever felt – he could feel it too, the hot hand grasping her wrist, the strange sense of fear and danger that permeated from the baby in Elizabeth's lap. Just as quickly as it began, the scream ended as Nina was wrenched away from Genevieve's grip, while at the same time a silvery-turquoise rush flooded into the Doctor's mind.

Rose.

Rose cradled Nina in her arms, eyes wide with fright, and raced back to the Doctor, who pulled them both to a far corner of the room, half encircling them with his arms, half watching Elizabeth and her ladies circle Genevieve again, closing the circle as if nothing had happened at all. Dex alone remained solitary, in between the circles, his eyes darting back and forth between his sister and the baby, still lost, his mind still shut away.

"Doctor," sobbed Rose, cradling Nina to her chest. Her thoughts were open to him now; and he prodded them without thought for her feelings, more concerned about what had happened while she'd been closed off. She was there, all of her, perfect and exactly as he'd left it last, only now there was a terror he didn't recognize.

"Rose," he said relieved, and kissed her forehead, resting his hand on Nina's head. Nina reached for him, and he kissed her as well, breathing hard. Nina's eyes were still clear, bright with tears now, blue and burning. The Doctor took another breath, and wondered when he'd breathed last.

"Her hand," said Rose, and the Doctor looked at Nina's hand, where Genevieve had held it. It burned bright red, and Nina held it out to him, tears running down her cheeks. The Doctor wasted no time; he pulled the sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and began to repair the burnt skin.

"What's going on?" asked Rose, the fear in her voice overcoming nearly everything else. "I couldn't find you – I kept trying to reach out to you, and you weren't there. You weren't anywhere."

"I'm here now, Rose." The Doctor glanced up at her, worry creeping into his eyes. He wanted to touch Rose's temples, to get a better look, but the burns on Nina's hand ran deep, though the little girl didn't make a sound while the sonic screwdriver did its work. Rose swallowed, and reached to touch his cheek, but pulled away as if his skin burned her fingers.

"You're worried – you're scared. What's scaring you, Doctor?"

"The baby, she locked you away from me," he told her. "That's why you couldn't find me. Whatever spell she wrought must have broken when she touched Nina – your maternal bond to Nina kicked in when she screamed. It's too strong for Genevieve to overpower it."

"Genevieve? Why does Elizabeth have a baby, Doctor? She was supposed to be the Virgin Queen. She can't have a baby."

The Doctor nudged her thoughts again, just a bit, and frowned. Rose's thoughts were retreating, slipping fast behind a turquoise shield. "No, Rose, hold on."

"Doctor?" asked Rose, her eyes growing hazy. "You're here."

"Hours ago, Elizabeth handed you the baby – don't you remember me telling you not to touch the baby?"

"I remember…you in a black coat," said Rose, clearly struggling. "And a blanket. Was that what you were saying? And then – I had a baby. Oh – Doctor. The baby – she's so sweet! You have to meet her – Nina should meet her!"

The Doctor stared at Rose – her eyes were still clouded over, her thoughts were solid again, he'd been carefully nudged right out of them, tipped outside the edges. He glanced at Nina's hand. The skin was repaired, and he pulled the child into his arms, wrapping her up safe.

"Rose," he said, and the odd note in his voice startled him. "Stay with me, Rose!"

"Nina's hand is better," said Rose dreamily, and she kissed her silent daughter before rejoining the group in the center of the room, where Dex had already rejoined the baby.

Nina sniffled, and wrapped her fingers around the Doctor's lapel again. The Doctor kissed her forehead, eyes firmly on the tableau in the center, his son and his Rose among them, lost in the spell Genevieve wove.

* * *

The Doctor waited.

Nina had finally fallen asleep, her face dry of tears but locked in worry and sorrow. He couldn't comfort his daughter, knowing she wanted her mother's arms and her mother's kisses. Rose, oblivious, remained at the side of the infant who wove the spell. The Doctor cradled Nina, whispering softly to her in Gallifreyan, telling her not of temporal abnormalities but reciting from memory as many tales of ducks and rabbits and foxes and soxes as he could remember. Just as she fell asleep, she'd reached and touched his cheek, and he kissed her forehead softly before setting her down on the nearest chair, as far away from the madness in the center of the room as possible.

As the hours moved on, more people joined the room, slightly dazed, and the Doctor watched as they one by one approached the baby, and turned away with cloud-covered eyes, completely under the spell the child wove. No one seemed inclined to leave the room, not for food, not for rest. As the hours went on, each one found a place to curl up and sleep, and even Elizabeth herself lay on a nearby settee, feet tucked under a pillow. The last one awake, Rose returned to the Doctor, a dreamy smile on her face, holding Dex's hand in hers.

The Doctor touched Rose's arm when she stopped before him, unsure if she would respond to him. It was worse, he thought, than when she'd been possessed by Cassandra on New Earth – at least then she walked and talked, even if was with a different step and a different voice; this was a thousand times worse. This was a Rose-not-Rose, and he hated it.

"Rose," he said, trying to sound as gentle and stern as possible. "Talk to me."

Rose looked at him, and for a moment he wasn't sure she understood. "I should go to bed. There's a bed in the room they gave us upstairs."

"Then go," said the Doctor gently, but Rose shook her head.

"I – I don't think I can. I don't want to leave Genevieve."

Dex tugged on his mother's arm. "Go to sleep, Mummy," he said, and Rose smiled at her son, leaning over to kiss his cheek. She stood back up again, and touched the Doctor's cheek, just as lovingly, before drifting to the chair where Nina slept, where she curled next to her daughter and closed her eyes.

The Doctor swallowed, watching Rose sleep, her mind still slippery, just as absent as when she'd been lost in Pete's World. The only thing that distracted him was the tug on his trouser leg, and he looked down to see Dex gazing up with wide eyes.

"Hi, Dad," said the boy, and the Doctor knelt to look at his son, wondering why Dex's eyes hadn't clouded over like the rest.

"Hello, Dex."

"You'll figure it out, won't you, Dad?" asked Dex, hopeful in his exhaustion. "It's not her fault, not really."

The Doctor loved his son, trusted him, believed in him, supported him, protected him.

But Dex was wrong.

"Go to sleep, Dex, I'll set everything to right," said the Doctor, but Dex held his ground and frowned.

"You're going to hurt her, aren't you? It's not Janie's fault, Dad. She didn't know what she was doing. She didn't mean it."

The Doctor's hearts went cold, and he gripped his son's shoulders. "What did you say?"

"Janie didn't mean to do it," repeated the boy. "You can help her, can't you?"

"Who's Janie?"

"She's asleep in the cot."

"Genevieve?"

Dex sighed in exasperation, a peculiar expression covering his face, which strangely resembled the one his father wore every so often when confronted by ignorance, not that the Doctor would recognize it. "Her name is Janie. She told me so. Boy, Dad, you aren't half smart, are you?"

The Doctor stood, subconsciously using his son to boost him up, and strode to the cot, where the child lay sleeping, oblivious to the man who now stared at her, mouth unable to close. Five years he'd been waiting – and he never once thought the mysterious Janie would be presented in nappies. She was rosy-cheeked with paper-thin eyelids, softly closed fists by her ears. Dex joined his father, setting a hand on the Doctor's trouser leg, and peered into the cot.

"Her thoughts taste like peaches," said Dex, and the Doctor glanced at his son.

"You read her thoughts?"

"All the time – she reads mine. That's how I know her name."

The Doctor looked back at the baby, grimacing. Anyone else might have thought he could smell a particularly sour scent coming from the child, but really, he was remembering Nina at the same age. The comparison didn't sit well. Too many things didn't sit well that day, least of all his son asking him to help the creature who hurt his daughter.

There was absolutely nothing to be done about it; the Doctor knew he had to follow timelines. He had to stick to what had already occurred. He didn't have any choice in the matter; he couldn't change what he'd been told he already did.

"Martha knew," he muttered.

"Aunt Martha knew what?"

"That Janie was a baby," replied the Doctor. "She told us not to toss out the baby things when Nina grew out of them. She said, keep them handy, might need them again. You never know. Ha. She knew. She never said a word."

"Would it have messed up timelines?"

The Doctor sighed. "Yes."

Dex nodded sagely. "Can't mess up timelines."

The Doctor sighed again. "No."

Dex tugged on his father's trousers. "Fix her, Dad."

The Doctor pulled the cellular modifier out of his pocket, and snapped the sonic screwdriver into the port on the side. He slid on his glasses and began scanning the sleeping child, reading the viewscreen on the modifier, as Dex looked up at him with hopeful, trusting, crystal-clear eyes. The readings poured out of the modifier.

"Your mother should be awake for this," he said dryly. "She'd like the Spockness of the moment."

"Dad," interrupted Dex.

The numbers flashed by on the viewscreen; he struggled to make sense of them. "Yes, Dex, what is it?"

"Dad, why'd Aunt Martha know about Janie?"

"We all knew about Janie," said the Doctor. "Only Aunt Martha knew she was a baby. The rest of us assumed she was older."

"Oh." Dex thought for a moment, and then tugged on his father's trousers again. "Dad?"

The Doctor sighed. "Dex—"

"It's important," insisted his son. "I mean – if you knew about Janie, why don't you know what's wrong?"

"We didn't know about Janie. We knew there would be a Janie."

"That's not what you said."

"It's complicated."

"No, it isn't. Either you knew about Janie, or you didn't. I don't think you did, or you wouldn't have been so surprised to see her, and you'd know without scanning what she is."

The Doctor was tired and heartsick. He missed Rose, he hurt for Nina, and he hated the way Dex's mind was closed to him while the boy still managed to walk and talk as though everything was normal. "Sometimes I don't know things, Dex."

"Good thing you've got me, then."

"You don't know what Janie is, do you?"

"Yes," said Dex.

The Doctor's eyes left the viewscreen to stare at the boy. Dex looked calmly up at him, his fingers still gripped on the trouser leg. The Doctor wondered if he was half as annoying when he was as self-assured as his son was at that moment. "Out with it, then. Let's hear it."

"She's a Chamalien, of course."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Oh?" He glanced back at the viewscreen, and his eyes widened. "Oh." He looked at the baby. "Well. So she is. Clever you."

"Oh, that was easy," scoffed Dex. "She told me she was, that's how I knew."

"Doesn't explain the whole mind control bit, though," said the Doctor, snapping the cellular modifier closed. "Chamaliens have a little bit, to keep themselves safe from unknown assailants, but she's got the whole house under her spell."

"That's what she needs help with," explained Dex, very patiently. "She can't control it, and it's getting worse. Hardly anyone's willing to leave the house now. And there's more people here now than there were before. She's scared, Dad – the circle's getting bigger every day, and she doesn't know how to stop it. Can you help her?"

The Doctor laid his hand on his son's head for a moment, seeing the brown eyes fill with tears. "You're all right."

"I told her you could help. You've got to help, Dad, you've got to."

The rustle of clothes distracted the Doctor, and he turned to see Elizabeth sit up on her settee, her eyes clouded and red, but her back straight and her mouth firm. "Doctor," she said, staring at him. "What are you doing to my child?"


	6. Chapter 6

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Six: A Woman Not Rose**... As Director of Torchwood, Mickey Smith doesn't often investigate the aliens who invade Earth. He's making a special exception for this one.

* * *

**Chapter Six: A Woman Not Rose**

Mickey Smith had not forgotten Rose Tyler, but he was ashamed to admit he did not think of her as often as he once had. He had trouble remembering her face sometimes, and often grew confused about when she had been with them in the parallel world, and for how long. Sometimes he remembered her present at events when no one else did. Most everyone laughed and teased him, saying the Director of Torchwood couldn't possibly be losing his memory so soon. Mickey laughed with them, but after a while he simply did not mention Rose at all, to anyone. If he remembered her being present, he didn't say. It was easier to leave her out of things than have others question his sanity.

He knew, of course, that Rose continued to talk to Jackie on a daily basis. The intervening thirty years since Rose's disappearance had brought some significant advances in the fields of technological science, particularly in the world of measuring and evaluating alien tech. For the past ten years, the blue box in Room Negative 27 had been under close surveillance, its previously unreadable measurements catalogued and recorded for Mickey's private evaluation. The box remained stable, and in its stability, had become just a bit more active, particularly in the early morning hours, which Mickey later realized corresponded with every one of Rose's phone calls to her mother.

However, Mickey had not actually _seen_ the blue box for some time, and so after leaving the Tyler residence, after having assured Jackie Tyler that the box was safe and untouched, he immediately went to ensure it was so.

He barely glanced at the trunk in the corner, where the leftovers of his frantic rescue were still safely locked away. The box was not humming – hadn't hummed in years. Mickey wondered what Rose's last moments were like, before she fell through it – had she seen something there, and followed it? Or had she tripped, and lost her balance? Mickey had never thought to ask. He supposed it didn't really matter; the Doctor had been there to catch her.

Funny, that. Rose might have been clever and capable, but she always needed someone to catch her in the end. Mickey had caught her after the debacle with Jimmy Stone. Pete Tyler had caught her from falling into the Void at Canary Wharf. Mickey remembered a story about the famous Captain Jack Harkness catching Rose when she fell off a barrage balloon in 1941. Mickey wondered if she'd needed catching since the Doctor had done it on the other end of the blue box.

Mickey glanced at the sensometer, sitting quietly on the floor near the blue box. It went about its business, recording and measuring, but Mickey knew that there hadn't been a spike on its charts in two days, not since the last time Rose had called Jackie. A corresponding meter in his private office would have told him of any such activity. If the woman at the hospital was Rose Tyler, she hadn't come home through the crossroads.

Mickey gave the blue box a long stare, and wondered.

* * *

Jackie Tyler would have been pleased to see Mickey's top-floor office. There was a view of London through the large plate-glass windows. The bookshelves were neatly organized and spacious. Best of all, the floor was covered in a lush, dark red carpet. It was an office that befitted the director of Torchwood, and it took Mickey nearly three months before he finally came to terms with it actually being his.

Still, it usually gave him something of a thrill to see how others reacted to it. The young Torchwood physician who waited for his return from Room Negative 27 was completely tongue-tied and instantly nervous to have been caught alone in the director's office, much less sitting on a chair provided for visitors. Mickey held out his hand for the boy to shake.

"I'm Mr. Smith," said Mickey. "I believe you are Eric Jenson?"

"Yes, that's right." Jenson shook Mickey's hand, and did not let go immediately.

"I'm told you can brief me on the woman at Princess Grace Hospital."

"Oh, yes, fascinating case," said Jenson, still shaking Mickey's hand, and Mickey gave him a quick squeeze, which seemed to shake the doctor out of his reverie. Jenson dropped the hand, and laughed nervously. "Fascinating. At approximately 4:30 a.m. yesterday morning, a woman was brought into the emergency care ward, suffering from extreme hypothermia, dehydration, and labored breathing. She was semi-conscious but quickly slipped into a coma, which is when the physicians on duty discovered that she had two functioning hearts. There is some evidence of oddities with her respiratory system as well, but otherwise she appears to be human in form."

Jenson seemed to calm down as he spoke, the comforting medical jargon giving him some sort of life raft in an unusual location. Mickey had seen it many times in the two years since he'd become the director, and he knew how to use it.

"We don't believe she is human, do we?"

"Not unless she's taken an evolutionary leap, but if she's alien – and we believe she is – we have yet to identify her. There are simply no records of any sort of species with her particular physiology."

"She has _not_ regained consciousness?"

"No. We – if I may be blunt, sir?" Mickey nodded, and Jenson continued. "We believe she's dying."

Mickey raised an eyebrow. "You cannot identify her, and yet you have reason to think she is dying? How do you know this isn't her general biological state?"

The doctor steadied himself on the nearby chair. "Sir," he said, his unease showing through again, "we are certain. Her systems have been growing steadily weaker since we first began monitoring her. She produces no brain patterns and makes no movement. She is unresponsive to every test we have been able to do. Her temperature has been going down at a steady rate and her hearts show clear signs of stress. Her entire body is breaking down. We very much doubt if she will ever wake to tell us so much as her name."

_Rose._

Mickey shook his head – the woman was not, could not be Rose. It was impossible. Rose was in a parallel world, thirty years behind the rest of them. She was with the Doctor, safe in the TARDIS.

And Rose was human.

"Take me to her," said Mickey.

* * *

Princess Grace Hospital wasn't the most convenient to Torchwood Tower, but it was one of the few private hospitals in London where secure rooms were located, where patients of questionable origin could be safely kept until they could be relocated to the tower itself, which had its own medical facility, to include doctors, nurses, and any number of useful instruments and machines. The woman with two hearts, however, was in such a fragile state, when it came time for her to be transferred to Torchwood, her first stop would likely be the morgue.

Dr. Jenson led the way down the blue and white hall, whisking by open doorways and nurses' stations with a quick gait before stopping at a closed door. He pressed his Torchwood badge against the card reader on the doorframe, and with a soft click, the door swung open. The room behind it was dark, with a single light shining onto a single bed, in which lay the woman.

Not Rose.

Mickey walked into the room, eyes focused on her. She was old, her skin feathery and transparent, her hair thin and white, crushed by her slumber, but surely it had floated like a halo when she was well. The hospital blankets were draped over her, and she was so thin they nearly lay flat on the bed. Numerous machines surrounded her, each buzzing or beeping in a symphony only they could follow.

Mickey gripped the rails alongside the bed and closed his eyes, lowering his head. He hadn't really expected to see Rose there, but somehow knowing for certain that it was not her brought a profound disappointment. It didn't answer any of the other questions, of course, but nonetheless, despite the report of the woman's imminent death, he couldn't help but wish it had been Rose, just so that he could have closed the books on her one last time.

"We know nothing about her, nothing at all?" said Mickey gruffly.

"Not really. She was found in Regent's Park, near the lake. Apparently she was incoherent, speaking a mix of languages. English, Greek, Russian, and a few alien tongues – Sycorax and Nestene among them, and those are the ones I can pronounce out of what was recognized."

"What did she say?"

"That's the trouble, bits of flotsam and jetsam, nonsense really. She was apologizing, mostly, and sometimes cursing. She might have been calling for someone, but we can't be sure. There wasn't time for translators or transcribers, all we have to go on are the witness accounts, because within minutes of entering the hospital, she lost consciousness."

The door opened, but Mickey didn't notice it. "I thought we had someone on staff."

"Doctor Jones called us the minute the second heart was found."

"He should have called us sooner," snapped Mickey.

"There wasn't much point," said a cool, female voice, and Mickey turned to see a woman standing in the doorway, lit by the hallway behind her. He couldn't make out her face until the door slid shut again, and his eyes refocused in the dim light. She was tall, he noticed, and her dark hair was pulled into a low ponytail. She might have been near Mickey's age. There were faint lines around her dark eyes, and she did not look one bit amused.

"Doctor Jones?" asked Mickey.

"Director Smith," replied Dr Jones. "Fancy seeing you here. I would think you'd have better things to do than witness the death of a medical oddity."

"Hardly a medical oddity, Dr Jones. You're certain she won't wake?"

Dr Jones didn't answer him immediately; instead, she walked over to the patient and felt her wrist for a pulse, eyes on the clock as she counted. Mickey watched her closely, wondering why he hadn't caught any whiff of perfume, but he supposed she spent too much time in the hospital to smell like anything but soap and rubbing alcohol. She didn't wear any jewelry, save for the thin gold necklace and a thin gold ring on her right ring finger.

Dr Jones sighed when she was done reading the pulse, and straightened the covers over the woman. "Is it so important to you that she wakes up?"

"I wouldn't ask otherwise."

She shrugged, turning to look at him. "Nothing is certain in medicine, Mr. Smith. I can only tell you what I believe, and I believe the patient will die in the next 24 hours. It's highly unlikely she will regain consciousness. I've had experience with alien life forms, but while hers is new to me, it's not entirely unfamiliar. She resembles humans quite a bit, in her general structure, apart from a few key differences. I'm certain she is dying, Mr. Smith, even if medical science is not."

Mickey closed his eyes, the disappointment rolling over him. It wasn't Rose in the bed, but nonetheless he couldn't help but feel that the woman might have been a link slipping through his fingers. All he could do was watch her die.

"Mr. Smith?"

Mickey looked back at Dr Jones, who watched him with a worried frown. "It's nothing, Dr Jones."

She clearly hadn't been expecting his reaction. "I'm sorry I couldn't give you better news."

"We don't even know her name," said Mickey grimly. "There's nothing we have to go on, to learn who she is."

Dr Jones took a step closer to stand alongside him. "Actually – I think we might know something."

Mickey's eyes were sharp. "Tell me."

"She was barely conscious when she came in – mostly moaning, but I thought I heard her say something before she slipped into the coma. There's no other identification, and it's not really a name, but we've had no other for her."

Mickey tried to rein in the sudden hope he felt – perhaps there was still a chance, a last message. She might have said anything – she might have said everything. "What did she say?"

"Just one word," said Dr Jones. "At least, one in the dozen or so that I recognized. It's not even English."

"Dr Jones – _tell me_ what she said."

Dr Jones looked from the woman in the bed to the man standing next to her. Before she even spoke, Mickey felt his hopes dashed to the floor.

"Theta. She said theta."

* * *

Mickey Smith did not like the Torchwood library, but he spent the night there anyway. The task of determining what "theta" meant, apart from a Greek letter, was too important to either give to one of the junior staff or to let wait until morning. It wasn't as if Mickey planned to sleep anyway – his nerves were shot, and his mind raced in a way it hadn't done since he'd had part of himself on the other side of the blue box in Room Negative 27.

There was not very much in the Torchwood files on an entity or being called Theta, not in the previous 150 years. Mickey's eyes burned from staring too long at the computer screen, and he was beginning to think nothing existed at all. Perhaps the woman had been reciting the alphabet. Perhaps she hadn't realized she'd said anything resembling an actual word.

"Theta" was a stupid name for an alien, anyway.

Mickey walked around the library's reading room, trying to stretch the cramp in his legs. It was a beautiful old room, circular in the same style as most grand library rooms across the western world, windowless and dark, with catwalks stretching overhead. It was while Mickey was walking along the catwalk that he happened to look down at the peculiar design of the shelving that circled the desks below. The shelves were arranged in a circular pattern, enclosing the desks within as they followed the exterior walls. The circle was broken by a bright green carpet running straight through it, denoting the only path leading in or out of the reading room.

It resembled the Greek letter theta.

Mickey flew down the circular steps at the end of the catwalk and quickly walked along the bookshelves, although he couldn't see anything particularly noteworthy about them. As far as he knew, they'd always been placed there, and there were no secret compartments or messages in them. When Mickey completed his circuit, he went straight to the center desk, where normally a librarian kept watch. As it was nearing 2 a.m., however, the desk was empty, but there was still a telephone number clearly posted for emergencies. Mickey didn't stop to consider what might constitute an emergency at 2 a.m.; when one was the director of Torchwood, anything could be an emergency. He picked up the telephone and dialed.

"Cooper," said the half-asleep voice after half a dozen rings.

"Why are the shelves in the reading room placed as they are?" demanded Mickey.

Cooper, whoever she was, did not seem the least bit fazed at the oddness of the question; perhaps she'd had stranger ones in the middle of the night. "It's the original design of the library. We can't move them; they're fixed to the floor. Devil of a time replacing the hardwood when the place flooded two years ago."

"When was the library built?"

"Turn of the last century, I think. 1899? Before Queen Victoria died anyway, she apparently approved the design herself. It's in one of the histories on Torchwood – Room B, Lane 46, Shelf 5, if you want it."

Mickey couldn't help but be impressed. "Thanks," he said before hanging up the phone, and thought that if Cooper was right about the shelf, he'd see about giving her a promotion, or at least someone else to do the evening call-duty.

Mickey found the histories of Torchwood exactly where Cooper had said they were, and he collected the ten volumes off the shelf and carried them back into the reading room. He went straight to the building of Torchwood Tower, skipping the preambles and charters and the rest, and after about five minutes, found a single line:

_Queen Victoria particularly approved of the shape of the library, and its inclusion of the Greek letter_ theta_, which had of course been present when she founded the Institution twenty years previously._

Mickey flipped backwards through the book, immediately switching tactics, and found the chapter outlining the origins of Torchwood. It wasn't long before he found another passage of interest.

_It was then that Queen Victoria found herself with the two mysterious strangers. They seemed more intrigued by the werewolf than the possibility of escape. Indeed, while they sped the Queen to safety, they laughed as though in the midst of a merry chase, coaxing the wolf ever closer, until at last the small party consisted of only the Queen herself, the man with the Northern accent known only as Theta, and the woman with the long, dark hair._

Mickey turned the page, and a drawing stared up at him. The caption indicated it was the man known as Theta and his unnamed female companion. There could be no mistaking the sharp edges of his face, the close-cropped hair, or the ears that sat like handles on a jug. Even the leather jacket was the same: it was the Doctor, as Mickey first knew him. The woman was familiar only as a younger form of the woman who lay dying at Princess Grace Hospital, but Mickey's eyes were focused squarely on the Doctor.

Theta. If Mickey had any doubt left, it was gone now. The woman had called for the Doctor, using the name Theta for some reason. Perhaps that was his name, or at least the name she knew him by. Mickey tore his eyes away from the picture and kept reading, shaking his head as he went. The sense of déjà vu was overpowering – but in his version, it was the other Doctor, the pinstriped pretty boy who had bested the beast, and he'd done it with a blonde girl named Rose.

Parallel universes, not so different from each other. Mickey wondered why he'd never questioned how far back the differences went. They hadn't seemed so deep...but clearly, this world had split from the world he'd been born into long enough ago that it was a different Doctor, a different companion, who inspired the creation of Torchwood.

Mickey rested his head on the book and listened to his own breath. There could be only two explanations, and Mickey didn't know which was correct: either this Doctor was Mickey's Doctor from before he met Rose, or – and this is the theory that Mickey believed – he was a different version of that Doctor, one who had lived in this world all along.

The Doctor had been so sure there was only one of him...but he had been sure of lots of things – the impossibility of Rose Tyler's return chief among them. That a second Doctor might exist did not surprise Mickey in the least.

Mickey didn't know why this Doctor, who called himself Theta, traveled with this woman, or how he'd come to be in the parallel world, or where he could be found. The only person who could answer Mickey's questions lay in a hospital bed, hours from death.

* * *

It was an hour before dawn, and the hospital was silent. Mickey sat on the chair next to the woman's bed and watched her labored breathing, so shallow that he almost couldn't see her chest rise and fall. The machines around her had long since been silenced, and no nurses had stopped by in several hours. It wasn't that they were not attentive, but that Mickey had asked them to stop coming. Nothing would save the woman now. There was little need to disturb her rest.

An hour before dawn – across the city, Mickey knew, Jackie was waiting for her mobile to ring, but he had an idea that Rose would not be calling that day, either. It was the third day Rose would not call her mother, and Mickey intended to go to Jackie as soon as the woman died, so that he could tell her what he did not know. He wasn't sure if he would mention the Doctor, or the mysterious Theta. He imagined he would think of something when he got there.

"Just one question," Mickey said aloud, his voice a whisper in the darkened room. "That's all I really need, just the answer to one question. Where is the Doctor, the one you call Theta? Why did he leave you?"

A breeze brushed the back of his neck, and Mickey turned to see the door opening as Dr. Jones entered the room. She stopped partway, staring at Mickey. "Oh – I didn't think anyone was here," she stammered, the light from the hall spilling in around her.

"Thought someone should sit with her," explained Mickey. "Do you need to—?" He waved his hand at the machines, and Dr Jones shook her head.

"No, there's nothing I can do. I was going to sit with her, but if you'd rather—"

"It's all right, if you want to stay."

The doctor smiled at him, shyly, and let the door close quietly behind her as she pulled up a chair next to him. "Did you find what you needed?"

"No," said Mickey. "Only more questions she can't answer. I believe I know what she was – a race called the Time Lords, but they're long since extinct."

"So she's the last?"

"It would seem so, but I believe she had a companion at one time. A man I knew – or thought I did. I'd hoped she could tell me what happened to him."

"I'm sorry," said Dr Jones quietly.

"Yes, well – I'll never know. Gotten used to never knowing, really. One can't know every outcome of every possibility in the world. This or any other."

Another breeze brushed the back of his neck, and Mickey turned again, but the door remained closed.

"I understand perfectly," sighed Dr Jones with a slight smile. "I just wish more of my patients did. Explain to a cancer patient trying to choose between one treatment or another that you can't know for sure what will happen in either case – not for certain, anyway."

"You said something like that earlier."

"Did I? I suppose I've stopped believing in certainties. I didn't think the director of Torchwood would ever step foot in this room, but here you sit."

"Here I sit," repeated Mickey softly, turning his attention to the woman on the bed.

"I – I hope I'm not being too rude, but if you don't mind me asking – you said you knew her companion?"

Mickey hesitated. "In a way, I did. I traveled with him for a little while. It's how I came here, actually. It was an accident, at first, landing here. I decided to stay."

"Oh – I thought – your accent was London."

Mickey laughed once, sharply. "I was born in London. Just not this London. A different London, on a parallel world, one where Time Lords existed. Well, he existed. He was the last in that world. I suppose she's the last in this world. Her companion, the one she called Theta – I think he was this world's version of the man I knew." He sighed, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand in the breeze, and glanced at the doctor sitting beside him. Her expression was masked in the dark. "I must sound a little mad to you. I'm not. I don't usually tell people I come from a different version of London."

"I can understand why not," said the doctor quietly. "It does sound a bit far-fetched. What happened to him? This Time Lord of yours?"

"He went back. Saw him once, three years later. I haven't seen him in thirty years, but I know someone who wants to talk with him quite badly. Her daughter traveled with him – still does, or should. I'd like to think this woman's Theta could help me. It's complicated."

"Sounds it," said Dr Jones. One of the machines began to beep softly, and she quickly sprang to her feet to look at it, before turning to Mickey with a hollow look in her eyes. "Mr Smith – it's time."

Mickey stood and took the dying woman's hand in his. Her skin was cold to the touch – he wasn't sure how a person could be so cold yet still alive. Every breath she took caught in her throat, and Mickey leaned close, watching the clear struggle on her face.

She was not Rose. But Mickey thought she must have been beautiful, once, in a way that the drawing in the library book couldn't show. And she'd traveled with him, her Theta – they'd laughed and joked together, much in the same way that the Doctor had done – did do – would always do – with Rose. Mickey felt such a rush of certainty, holding her hand, that despite the deep disappointment which came with it, he managed to speak the words she needed to hear.

"It's all right," he whispered to her. "I don't know who you are, or what you were to him. But if he isn't here, he must be dead – he's waiting for you. I'm sure of it."

The woman let out a last breath, long and deep, and moved no more. Mickey felt something change in her hand – as though the spark of life slipped out of her in her breath and floated away. He looked at Dr Jones, who stood near the machine, watching silently.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice thick, and Mickey nodded, unable to speak for a moment. He rested his free hand on the woman's forehead, and then pulled away, shoving his hands into his pockets before turning to leave the room.

In the shadows, just beside the door, stood a figure that made Mickey freeze.

She was tall and thin, with long, dark hair, and large green eyes. She wore a shift-like dress that had no color to it, but that might have been because she had little color to her at all, apart from the eyes that burned into Mickey as though searching his soul. Mickey stood completely still, watching her. He wasn't sure entirely how the woman stood there, when she had just died in the bed behind him, but he knew without a doubt that he was looking at a younger version of the mysterious woman.

"Hello," he said finally, and the woman took a step forward. She wasn't quite transparent, but she wasn't corporeal either; Mickey could only barely see the walls behind her.

"How did you come here?" she asked. Her voice wasn't quite transparent either; it sounded full and complete, as though she really existed. Mickey supposed she really did, in a way. "To this world – from your own?"

"The Doctor brought me in the TARDIS. We slipped through a hole in the Void. He went back and closed it."

The woman wrapped her arms around herself. "You know the Doctor?"

Mickey's heart began to thump; he could hear the blood in his ears. "You know him?"

She nodded, rubbing her hands against her upper arms. "Yes, I—"

"Where is he? Why did you call him Theta? Why isn't he here?"

She shook her head. "No – you don't understand. That's – that's not exactly me in that bed. I didn't call him Theta. _She_ did."

"You're her," Dr Jones interrupted. Mickey had forgotten Dr Jones was even in the room; he didn't dare look away from the woman in the corner, for fear she would vanish into the cold air. "You're her, aren't you?"

"No," repeated the woman, her gaze now resting on Dr Jones. "I was her once, but then – she journeyed on a different path than I did. Her path brought her here, to this world, this hospital, this death. My path – it took me to a parallel world, a different world, a different death." The woman looked back at Mickey. "In that world, there was a man named the Doctor. And I loved him, but he left me. He lived on, when all the rest of us died. It was as it should have been, but I wanted to see something different. So I came here, to this world, to see what might have been, if I'd stayed with him. This is how it would have ended for me, dying alone in a hospital bed – not quite so different."

"I don't understand," said Dr Jones.

"No, you wouldn't," said the woman. "But I think Mr Smith might. Don't you, Mr Smith?"

"You're from my world," said Mickey. "Aren't you?"

She smiled then. "Yes. I think so."

"Who are you?"

The woman glanced at the older, other version of herself for a moment, considering. "In this world, I am no one; I am the outcome of a chance not taken. A ghostly possibility, I think that's what she would have called me. But in your world – the world into which I was born and died – the Doctor called me Carissa."

* * *

**A/N: **_(If you're wondering why "Carissa" rings a bell, might want to head back and read the second part of Crossroads, "One Day", again.)_


	7. Chapter 7

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Seven: The Etymology of Names**... Mickey Smith and Dr Jones listen to a tale neither can quite believe. The Doctor begins to accept a path he doesn't want to travel.

* * *

**Chapter Seven: The Etymology of Names**

For some reason, Dr Jones went with them. Mickey hadn't asked her along, and she hadn't asked to accompany them, but all the same she buckled herself beside Mickey in his car, with Carissa sitting behind them, calm, serene, and pale.

"I want you to explain it to me," said Mickey, gripping the steering wheel. He glanced at the reflection of Carissa in the rearview mirror as he carefully navigated the car out of the underground parking lot. "How is it you're in this world? Why are there two of you? Why is the Doctor called Theta?"

"That was his name, when I knew him," replied Carissa.

"Who's the Doctor?" demanded Dr Jones.

"He's the man who brought me here," explained Mickey. "A Time Lord in a blue police box."

"And you think she knows him?"

"I know she does," said Mickey grimly. "I found a picture of them together, she and him. They're the ones who convinced Queen Victoria to start Torchwood. In this world, anyway – in my world, it was the Doctor and Rose."

Dr Jones put her hand on her forehead. "So if she's from this world, how do you think she knows _your_ world's Doctor?"

Mickey hadn't thought of that; he glared at the figure in the rear view mirror, as if daring her to explain.

"It's a valid question," said Carissa. "One to which I'd like the answer, please."

"You called him the Doctor," said Mickey stubbornly. "It was you, wasn't it, brushing against my neck in the hospital? Every time I mentioned the Doctor, I felt something. It was you. All the records about him in Torchwood – they call him Theta. He was never the Doctor in this world. But you call him Doctor, same as I do. You know the same Doctor I do. I want to know how."

Carissa smiled. "Oh, you are clever. He must have liked you."

"He called me an idiot."

"I doubt that."

"Doctor Theta is an odd name," said Dr Jones, and Carissa laughed.

"That wasn't his name, not together like that. He didn't take on the name Doctor until much later, after we were older and more experienced in the world. When I knew him best, he was Theta. That wasn't his name either, you must understand, just as Carissa wasn't mine. It's only how we called each other. He had a love for all things human even then, you see – choosing a Greek letter as a name!" She laughed, lost in her memory.

"Theta was the symbol for death," persisted Dr Jones.

Carissa looked approvingly at Dr Jones. "In Athens, yes, it was. But it also symbolized the Agathodaemon, a good spirit representing luck and wisdom. I believe he liked the duality of the symbol. It proved appropriate enough, in time."

"He never told me about the name Theta," said Mickey. "He never said anything about you."

Carissa didn't answer right away; she glanced out the window to the soggy streets of London whisking by. Mickey kept his gaze divided between the road and her reflection, waiting somewhat impatiently for her response.

"How much do you know about him?"

"He's a Time Lord," said Mickey. "An alien from some other planet. Nine hundred years old, he said."

"Older than that."

"Well, he said it, I'm not guessing. Has a ship he calls the TARDIS shaped like a blue police box. And he can change his appearance. The picture I found in the Torchwood library, it was of the first way I saw him, with no hair and big ears and a black jacket. Next time I saw him, it was sideburns and a brown pinstripe suit."

Carissa closed her eyes. "Yes," she murmured. "I knew him before all that, before he'd regenerated the first time. Did he ever tell you where he was from?"

"No."

"We were childhood friends. Always together in the nursery, sitting next to each other in lessons. We were inseparable. There weren't families as such on Gallifrey, you must understand, but I suppose you'd call us brother and sister, we were so close with each other."

"You loved him," said Dr Jones, and Carissa's eyes snapped open to look at her.

"You are from this world, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Perceptive, though. Yes, I loved him. He loved me. I was a little older than he was, and I had my TARDIS first. I took him with me on its maiden trip, because how could I not take him? Oh, it was wonderful. We circled the planet and shot off across the galaxy. We were giddy with the thrill of it, being away from the elders, away from school, away from anyone who might dare tell us what to do and how to do it. We found ourselves circling Varicose 3 and threw the TARDIS doors open to watch a star burn away, and I remember sitting with our legs dangling out, popping nuts into our mouths and laughing."

Carissa sighed, a long, lonely sound. Mickey thought he'd heard such a sigh once before, in a set of memories that hadn't actually happened.

"There are moments in life when you realize that the world is simply a journey, and you are walking a path which might go off in a thousand different directions. That moment, sitting in my TARDIS, Theta at my side – that was such a moment. I kissed him, or he kissed me. A brush of his lips against mine, it might have lasted thirty seconds or a thousand years. In my dreams, it was longer, but I don't know. When we pulled away from each other, the look in his eyes – oh, how they glowed. How his very thoughts shimmered! And I knew if I leaned in again for another kiss, it would be the end of it.

"But I didn't, you see. I was afraid of that kiss, of what might follow. Such things – they were unheard of for us, for our people. I don't think he was sorry for it, really. He smiled at me, a little sad, but so understanding. Perhaps he was a little afraid too – we were both so _good_ then, you see. Such fine young students, so unwilling to break with tradition and try something new. We followed the paths laid out for us with unerring precision."

"You weren't allowed to love him?" asked Dr Jones, faintly horrified.

"Oh, love him, of course, I could love him. It was the rest that would have met with disapproval."

Mickey remained silent, focused on the road as the rain began to fall. Dr Jones, however, was proving to be an excellent interrogator. "What happened?"

"Before we closed the TARDIS doors, we saw something just outside, floating in the vacuum of space. It was small and brightly blue, shimmering as if newly formed, which I suppose it was, since we'd never seen its like before. It appeared to be trying to find a shape, moving between something spherical to star-burst and finally settling into a cube with rounded edges. Neither of us could take our eyes from it, and even as it became solid, I felt such an intense longing to touch it – to take back my earlier decision, that I nearly fell out of the doors toward it. Theta had to pull me back into the ship to keep me safe, and slowly our orbit pulled us away from it. My longing decreased as our distance increased, and soon, I'd forgotten about the pull altogether."

Mickey had trouble breathing. "A blue box."

"Yes."

"Did you ever find out what it was?" asked Dr Jones.

Mickey and Carissa spoke at the same time before staring at each other in the mirror. "A crossroads."

* * *

The rustle of clothes distracted the Doctor as he stood over Genevieve's cot, and he turned to see Elizabeth sit up on her settee, her eyes clouded and red, but her back straight and her mouth firm. "Doctor," she said, staring at him. "What are you doing to my child?"

The Doctor ignored the question. "Why did you name her Genevieve?" he asked. His hand still rested on Dex's head, mostly to hold the boy close to him. Dex's hands wrapped around his father's leg and he peered out from behind to the princess sitting on the other side of the baby's cot. The baby began to wake, mewing softly, but Dex turned his gaze to her and she instantly quieted again.

Elizabeth frowned. "It's her name. I thought it was pretty."

"Interesting choice for the child of an English princess, that's all. Germanic in origin, I believe."

"It's none of your concern," replied Elizabeth. "You haven't answered my question – what are you doing to my child."

"She isn't your child," said the Doctor, and he flipped the cellular modifier open again and looked at it. "Nope. Not even human." He snapped the modifier closed. "I know you found her somewhere, decided to keep her, started to love her. It's what you were meant to do, really. But even you must realize there's something wrong. More people are arriving every hour to sit with her, and they never go away. You've lost all will to leave the house, and in six months time your sister will die and you'll be handed the crown – and do what? Give it up to raise a child who isn't yours?"

Elizabeth stood, shaking. "How dare you. Genevieve is my child in every way that counts. She may not have been borne by me, but she is of me. She is as human as you or I."

"Half right," replied the Doctor. He flipped the modifier open again, and lifted it above his head, pressing the side button. Instantly the air above them began sparkling, glowing, and finally crystallized into a massive web, rising up from the baby in the cot, glowing golden as it arched through the room, connecting everyone to her but the Doctor and Nina in the corner. From her cot, Janie giggled, and tried to grab the strands. Dex laughed, watching her, and pressed his cheek to his father's leg, grinning madly.

Elizabeth gasped, staring at the web above her. She reached up to brush her fingers through the golden strands that touched her face, and though the strands shifted, they did not break.

"What is this magic?" she asked, amazement in her voice.

"Genevieve is an old name," explained the Doctor, gazing up at the golden web. "So old that most have forgotten its origins. All save for my people, who never forgot anything worth knowing in this world. It means woman of the people. You might have given her the name, princess, but she told you who she was when you first picked her up. She told you she was one of you. Genevieve."

Elizabeth fingered the strands of gold for a moment, their glowing light shining onto her face. "I found her in the forest – I'd broken away from the rest of them, and turned a corner, and there she was, waiting beneath the trees. She hadn't been there a moment before. I picked her up, and – Genevieve. And I brought her home."

The Doctor didn't take his eyes off Elizabeth. "I'm sorry."

"Why? Is she dangerous?" Elizabeth turned her gaze from the golden web to him. "Is this web dangerous?"

"It's the connection she formed with you," explained the Doctor. "Genevieve is a Chamalien – and a very young one, at that. Chamaliens leave their young scattered across the universe, where they take the forms of the living being that finds them first. Deer, dog, worm – it doesn't matter. They create a bond with that creature, so that they'll be taken care of, they'll live to maturity, and then they leave to find others of their kind. Genevieve found you."

Elizabeth smiled. "She did."

"But it's too strong, princess. She's cast the net too far, and it's drawing in more people than it should. Even now, more are coming to this house, more people to sit and care for her. She doesn't want it, but she can't stop it. I can help her stop it. I can help her break the net."

Elizabeth looked back up at the golden web. "What will happen if you don't?"

The Doctor paused. "Every connection she makes stretches her a little bit further. If she's stretched too far, her mind will snap. She'll die."

Dex gasped and his grip on the Doctor's leg tightened. The Doctor glanced down at his son, knowing that the boy hadn't expected his answer, knowing the child was suddenly afraid. That he should know this without also _feeling_ it took the Doctor by surprise.

"I don't want her to die," said Elizabeth softly. She stepped forward and gazed into the cot, leaning in to touch the baby's cheek softly. Janie looked up at her, blinking, and grabbed at her fingers, bringing them to her mouth. Elizabeth laughed softly, and leaned in to kiss the girl's forehead.

"Princess?"

"Will it hurt?"

Dex turned his gaze up to his father, repeating Elizabeth's question in a silent plea, and the Doctor pressed the boy's head to his leg in an equally silent response. "No," he said. "It won't hurt. You'll never know it happened, except you won't feel the same tug, the same irrational need to protect and defend. She'll be just another baby to you."

Elizabeth leaned over the cot, and her shoulders shook once, and then were still. She swiftly stood and walked away from them, and when she spoke, her voice was thick. "If I don't allow you to do this thing..."

"Two, three days," said the Doctor. "No more."

Elizabeth's hands gripped the edges of the fireplace mantle. "Do it."

* * *

"So you know about crossroads, then?" asked Carissa, amused.

"That's what it was, wasn't it?" demanded Mickey. "It was a crossroads. That blue box – it was a crossroads!"

Dr Jones stared at them both, her head whipping back between Mickey beside her and Carissa in the rear-view mirror. "What's a crossroads?"

Mickey didn't pay her any attention. "How did your crossroads get into Torchwood Tower?"

"I'm afraid I don't know what you mean – I went back to Varicose 3 several hundred years later, and the crossroads was still there."

"There's a crossroads in a lock-down room at Torchwood Tower," insisted Mickey. "Been there for thirty-one years. Rose Tyler fell into it thirty years ago to rejoin the Doctor in our original world."

Carissa fell speechless, staring at Mickey in some sort of shock, and Dr Jones took advantage of the quiet to try again. "I'm sorry, but could someone explain to me what a crossroads is?"

Neither of them heard her. "She fell in?" whispered Carissa. "A human child fell into a crossroads?"

"That's what I've been telling you," said Mickey impatiently. "The Doctor left her here with us, thirty-one years ago, and a year later, pulled her back through the crossroads to his world."

Carissa closed her eyes. "The poor child….oh dear. The poor girl…."

"Oi!" shouted Dr Jones finally. "What's a crossroads?"

"It's a way to move between parallel worlds," said Mickey, but Carissa's eyes flew open.

"No," she corrected him. "It's a chance not taken. It's the turn on the path you didn't travel, the way life might have gone had you done something differently in that single moment where the fate of the world balanced on your shoulders. There are a thousand such moments, and I witnessed one created before my eyes, when I chose to break the kiss with Theta, and return home to Gallifrey. I don't know what chance was lost at Torchwood Tower, Mr Smith, but it certainly was not mine. If your Rose Tyler fell through it, and you know she was met by the Doctor at the other end, and that she lived, then I am very glad for her—" Carissa's voice caught, and it took a moment before she could steady herself enough to continue. "But I cannot speak to your crossroads, Mr Smith. I can only tell you about mine."

"So tell," said Mickey.

"Please," added Dr Jones, with a stern glance at him.

"It was years before I thought about the crossroads again. I think Theta might have forgotten all about it – and it wasn't long afterwards that we both grew up a little more, and he had his first TARDIS. We followed our paths, never diverging, until – well. He left Gallifrey, he jumped from his path as surely as if pushed, and he didn't return to Gallifrey for years. When he did, he wasn't Theta any longer, but the Doctor. He'd lived through several regenerations, had many companions, most of them human, and he was as in love with the planet Earth and its people as I'd ever known him to be.

"Not that I knew him, then. He was lost to me, and I was just afraid enough of my friend, who'd agreed to remain on the proper path until he'd left it so abruptly, turning renegade and racing through the world, as unlike a Time Lord as any. Perhaps that is why, when Gallifrey faced certain death, he was the one chosen to end it all."

"You're talking about the Time War," interrupted Mickey.

Carissa paused and nodded carefully. "He told you about it?"

"A little bit," said Mickey. "Rose told me more. There were Daleks, and the Doctor – he destroyed them. Not just the Daleks, but the Time Lords, too." Mickey frowned. "You're a Time Lord."

"The proper term is Time Lady, but yes."

"You should have died with them."

"I did," said Carissa.

"But you're sitting here," said Dr Jones, and Carissa chuckled.

"In a way. You see, I watched Theta go off the chosen path, take a different journey from that which we'd assumed was set. It made me wonder what might have happened had I let him kiss me again, that day on my TARDIS. I knew there was little time left before the Time War was ended. I went to Varicose 3, and found the crossroads there. I could still feel the pull of it – just as strong as I remembered. This time, there was no Theta to pull me back. It was as I reached for it that he did whatever it was he was meant to do – and just as I touched the crossroads, felt my hand coated in blue, that was when I died. My body simply vanished.

"My mind, however, did not. I watched my body disappear into nothing, into never having been, and I felt myself sucked further into the crossroads, until I found myself sitting once more on the TARDIS floor, a ghostly, barely possible being, watching as a young Theta and Carissa kissed a second, a third, a fourth time while orbiting Varicose 3."

"You went back in time?" asked Dr Jones, barely breathing.

"That's what I thought, at first," said Carissa. "But no. The crossroads took my mind with it, back through time, and sent me down the other path. The one not taken – the one where I _had_ kissed Theta again, and he had kissed me. Where we did not return to Gallifrey – instead, we left the set path together, and remained together – lovers – for the next thousand years. I was not her, that pretty young thing who captivated and seduced him in a TARDIS I barely remembered. But I watched her with him, every moment reminding of the chance I had lost.

"I remember the Doctor, yes – fine, noble man, who destroyed the planet he came from to save the people he loved. I saw what might have become of him, in the parallel world I created in a single moment of indecision, in a world where I fell prey to my weakness and kissed him again. I've walked both paths of my life, Mr. Smith. How many can say they've done the same?"

The rain beat down on the little car, with the windshield wipers racing quickly across them. The tears were running down Dr Jones's cheeks; Mickey gripped the steering wheel hard. He didn't dare look away from the road to check Carissa's reflection; he had no doubt she was sitting completely still and careful in the backseat.

"At least one," Mickey replied. "And we're going to see her mother."


	8. Chapter 8

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Eight: Journey Ends, Journey Begins**... The Doctor and Genevieve work together, but Elizabeth's heart is broken. Carissa and Jackie work together, and Mickey's heart is healed.

* * *

**Chapter Eight: Journey Ends, Journey Begins**

It was hard work dismantling the golden web, more so because while the alien working with the Doctor was highly telepathic, it was also a baby.

"But I like her," Janie said as she helped him unravel the threads. They spoke to each other in the same sort of way he spoke to his own children, thoughts racing back and forth like multiple conversations, dizzying and complete with smells and tastes and touch. Dex was right; Janie had peach-flavored thoughts, sweet and tangy, and she'd very patiently listened to his instructions at first, before dutifully fixing her own mistakes. "I know I have to let the rest of them go, but can't I keep _her_?"

"No," said the Doctor, and gave the thread a tug, unleashing another serving girl. It was the third servant done, and they still hadn't managed to release either Rose or Dex, much less the princess herself. The web was so tangled, he couldn't tell which threads led where; they'd simply picked a thread and followed it along the line. "You shouldn't even stay here, Janie, much less keep her."

"But where would I go?"

"With me. Careful with the twist, there, you don't want to be too harsh."

"It's all wrapped up in knots. What if I don't want to go with you?"

"If it's any help, I don't particularly want you either."

"Then why ask me?"

The Doctor shrugged, an admittedly odd move for a telepathic conversation. "I've been told you're meant to be with me. Elizabeth asks me about you."

"When?"

"In her future, and my past. All right, you tug on this one now."

Janie tugged, a little too hard, and the woman at the end of the line was startled awake. "Ooops," said Janie, guilty, but the woman touched her temple, shook her head, and went back to sleep. "Will she be all right?"

"Bit of a headache when she wakes up, but I think so. Pick another one."

They worked in silence for three more people, and then Janie spoke again. "I want to keep her."

"No," repeated the Doctor.

Another two people, and Janie repeated her wish. "Please, Doctor? I'm being very good about the rest of them."

"No."

Finally, only Rose, Dex, and Elizabeth were left. It was easy to tell the threads now, and Janie had long since mastered the art of it, but the Doctor still watched. Janie crept down Rose's line, very careful to unravel it along the way, moving with such precision and care that the Doctor half thought she believed such diligence might be rewarded with the granting of her request. When at last one small connection remained, Janie pushed it just a bit toward him.

"Do you want to?" she asked.

He did, very much, and gave the thread the smallest tug. Silvery-turquoise flooded over him, washing him in cool relief, and he sighed in it, closing his eyes and relishing the sensation of _Rose_.

She slept, and though he could sense how tired she was, he didn't want to go another minute without hearing her voice. Janie headed toward Dex's threads, and the Doctor left her to it while his physical self crossed to where Rose lay sleeping, and gave her a kiss, pressing his lips to hers.

Rose's eyes fluttered as he drew away, and for a moment she looked confused and lost — and then the telepathic bond sprang into action as she realized it was active again. "Doctor," she breathed, and sat up, wrapping her arms around him and pressing her face into his neck. "Oh, you're _there_."

"Rose." He grinned, and held her tightly. He felt Dex's green thoughts spring to life behind him, and Rose began laughing, pulling out of the hug to kiss him soundly on the lips before she raced to her son. She fell on the floor before the child and pulled him into a hug.

"Mummy," groaned Dex, but Rose took no notice.

"Such a clever boy," she told him. "To tell Janie about the Doctor! You did exactly right."

"I know," said Dex, and squirmed as his mother gave him a kiss.

The Doctor scooped Nina up in his arms, still soundly asleep, and Rose kissed Dex once more before returning to take her daughter again. Dex trotted after her, and made faces as his parents kissed again.

"Ew," he said.

"You'll like it well enough one day," his father told him.

"No, I won't."

The Doctor thought he saw something glint behind Dex, but it was gone as quickly as it appeared. He looked over to Elizabeth then, who stood near the fireplace, staring at them. The golden thread that linked her and Janie were still strong, and Janie seemed to have stopped unraveling them.

"Janie," said the Doctor, both aloud and telepathically, "you have to keep going."

"No. I don't want to let her go."

"Janie, we talked about this."

"Dad?" asked Dex, but the Doctor didn't hear him.

"Please don't make me," she whimpered, and the Doctor left his family to kneel next to the crib. Tears streamed down the child's face, and he leaned in to touch her temples.

"Dad," repeated Dex, more urgently. "It's not Janie."

The Doctor frowned, recognizing the mind inside the child, and realizing it hadn't been the one speaking just then. "No, it isn't."

"Don't make me let her go," said Elizabeth. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she leaned against the fireplace as though she might fall down if she let go of the wall. Her entire body was shaking, her chest heaving, and dimly, the Doctor could tell that she was clinging for dear life to the threads binding her to the baby.

"Elizabeth," he said gently, it needs to be done."

"No."

"You know now — she's not of this Earth, despite her name. She can't stay here. She needs more than you or your England can give her."

"She's mine. I won't ever have another."

"I'm sorry," said the Doctor.

"It's not enough!"

Slowly, the Doctor himself began to unravel the threads. Janie crept after him, placing them in order, and Elizabeth could only watch as the web grew dimmer and dimmer, every thread slipping away.

"It was so lovely," said Elizabeth, watching the golden threads slip away. "Holding her. Feeling her feed into me, all that love and trust. I could feel my heart pound inside my chest, like it'd grown a thousand sizes larger. The whole world was a bubble around us, none of it mattered, just her and me. No one else. And love — oh! I think my mother must have felt it for me, when I was young and tender, when no one else loved me — she did. When no one else loves Janie, I will — and you're taking it away. The only love I'll ever feel, and I can see it slip away before my eyes."

A hand touched the Doctor's shoulder; he looked to see Rose standing beside him, with Nina in her arms. Nina was awake now, her head resting on Rose's breast, looking at her father with trusting blue eyes. Rose's mouth trembled.

"Don't," she said. "Not all of it. Please."

He stopped, two threads short of done, and let go.

The baby began to cry, and Elizabeth rushed over to scoop the child in her arms, kissing her face wildly, their tears intermingling. "Hush, my love, hush, my Genevieve," the princess murmured, and cradled the baby next to her breast. "Oh, love, my Janie. It's all right. We're still together. Can't you feel it? It's not as strong, but it's there."

Rose knelt next to the Doctor and kissed him, resting her forehead against his. "Thank you," she whispered.

He shook his head, refusing the thanks, and she cupped his cheek in her hand, lowering to look into his eyes. "You're a good man, you know that?"

"No," he said, and she kissed him again, her lips warm against his, her tongue wet and full. She tasted of peppermint — or perhaps that was just the silvery-turquoise that wrapped him round like a blanket.

"Doctor," said Elizabeth, and he broke the kiss to stand, facing the princess.

"Lady," he said.

"Thank you. I know you won't take it — but thank you. You are correct about Genevieve — she is a child born of the stars. She deserves nothing less in her life." Elizabeth's breath caught for a moment, and she turned her gaze down to the child who looked up at her intently. "I can't give it to her. But she tells me you can."

The Doctor swallowed. "I can."

Elizabeth took a step forward. She settled the baby into the Doctor's arms while her hands shook, and she dropped a kiss on the small forehead. "It's true, is it not — I'll never love a child as I love her?"

"It's true."

"Then I send my heart with you, Sir Doctor of TARDIS. Take care of her, or my deep and abiding trust will turn you into my greatest enemy. Bring her to see me again."

* * *

Donald Tyler was clearly flummoxed to see them so early in the morning. "D-d-doctor Jones?" he asked, his voice raising in a squeak, completely unbecoming in a man of 32 years. "I wasn't on the schedule last night, was I? I'm sure I had it marked as a day off–"

Dr Jones smiled reassuringly. "You're fine, Dr Tyler. I'm here with Mr Smith."

"You're unusually early," said Donald to Mickey, relieved to no longer be on the spot with his supervisor. "Mum's just finished with her breakfast."

"She asked me to look into something, and I didn't think she would want to wait. Is it all right if we go up?"

"Go on, it's fine. Molly's in with her now. You know the way."

Mickey led the way up the stairs, with Dr Jones following close behind. Carissa moved more slowly, looking at the photographs that lined the stairwell. She stopped on the landing, her gaze falling on a smaller photograph in a black frame. Dr Jones joined her after a moment, and when Mickey reached the top of the stairs, they were still there, looking.

"Such a lonely picture," murmured Carissa, her voice longing.

"Rose," said Mickey thickly. "Her mother is upstairs waiting."

Carissa turned away and continued up the steps; Dr Jones took another moment before tearing her gaze from the picture and meeting Mickey's eyes. He wondered then why she'd followed them to the house — professional curiosity, or something else? — and while Carissa began moving down the hall, continuing to gaze at the photographs that lined it, Mickey waited for the doctor to join him.

"I've never met you before, have I?" asked the doctor.

"No," said Mickey.

"Only — Rose looks familiar to me, for some reason. I don't know why."

"She lived here for a year, before going back to the Doctor. About thirty years ago — maybe you knew her."

"No," said Dr Jones. "I don't — no."

They found Carissa standing outside of Jackie's door, resting her forehead against it, her fingers splayed on the frame.

"She's in here," breathed Carissa. "Rose's mother. I can tell. She's — different. She's like you, Mr Smith. Neither of you belong here. Now Dr Jones, she has a strange electricity about her, but it matches the electricity all around us in this world. But you, Mr Smith — you and me, and Rose's mother — even Rose in the photograph below — we don't have it. We don't belong in this world. Oh, yes. We're from the same place, the four of us. I'm sure of it."

Mickey swallowed. "Come inside, I'll introduce you."

Molly sat beside her mother's bed, reading aloud from the morning paper, and looked up when they entered. "Oh, hullo, Uncle Mick," she said cheerfully. "Didn't expect you this early — and you've brought a lady friend, look at that, Mum! Uncle Mick's on the prowl."

"Just because I'm here with two women doesn't mean I'm on the prowl," said Mickey, and Molly gave him an odd look.

"You must have lost one along the way, because I only see the one in a doctor's coat, Uncle Mick."

Mickey glanced at Carissa, but she shook her head and stepped into the background. Molly continued talking.

"I'm Molly Tyler, very pleased to meet you."

"Martha Jones," said the doctor, and from the bed, Jackie gave out a small gasp. Molly quickly turned to her mother, reaching for her hand.

"Mum?"

"I'm all right," said Jackie Tyler, brushing her daughter away. "Let me talk with Mickey and Martha, won't you, love? You can read me the news later."

"If you like." Molly leaned into give her mother a kiss on the cheek. "Give a holler if they try anything funny, now."

Molly gave Mickey a wolfish grin on her way out, shutting the door behind her.

Jackie moved her gaze from Mickey to Martha Jones and back again, before resting her eyes on the figure behind them both.

"I don't know where to begin asking," she said.

The woman walked forward, until she stood at the end of Jackie's bed. "Hello."

"My daughter couldn't see you?"

"No," said Carissa. "Tell me about Rose."

Jackie swallowed. "She hasn't called in three days. Are you — are you the woman with two hearts? From the hospital?"

"Not quite."

Jackie turned her gaze to Dr. Jones. "I didn't think you were so old. The way Rose talked, I thought you were her age, perhaps a little older."

Mickey's blood went cold, but Dr. Jones didn't even blink.

"I never knew your daughter, Mrs. Tyler, I'm sorry."

Jackie frowned. "She talks about you. You — oh. You're the Martha Jones from _this_ world, aren't you?"

"I suppose I am. The — the other Martha? She knows Rose?"

"She traveled with the Doctor. She delivered my grandchildren."

Dr. Jones began to smile. "She's a doctor, too?"

"Not everything changes, from world to world," said Carissa softly, running her hands down the walls as she circled the room, until she stood next to the head of Jackie's bed. "But Rose — she doesn't exist in this world."

"No," said Jackie. "She didn't belong here, my Rose. That's why I sent her back to the Doctor."

"How?"

"He called it a crossroads. Blue box in one of the basements of Torchwood — Mickey can show you."

"He will," said Carissa. She let her hand drift toward Jackie's temples. "May I?'

Jackie looked at her warily for a moment, uncertain. She glanced at Mickey and Dr Jones, and then nodded. Carissa settled on the bed, facing her, and rested her fingertips on the older woman's temples, closing her eyes.

_I'm dying, you see._

"Oh," the Time Lady breathed. "Oh — I'm sorry."

"Everyone does, eventually," said Jackie. "I would like to see Pete again."

_I wanted to see the Doctor, before I died._

"Are you dead then?"

"Yes," said Carissa. "Only a memory now, and fading fast."

_As I will fade from Rose's._

_Do you regret sending her away?_

Jackie jerked away from Carissa's fingers; the sudden break in contact gave her a sharp pain, but Carissa seemed unaffected. "I don't regret anything," said Jackie, angrily, and she might have continued but for the coughing that racked her just then.

Dr Jones was at the beside in a moment, holding out a glass of water with a straw, and Jackie took it, sipping as deeply as she could.

"You should go," the doctor told Carissa. "She isn't well."

"She'll die whether I sit here or not," said Carissa quietly. "She asked after me, says Mickey Smith. I rather think she has something to say, and I won't leave before she says it."

The coughing fit subsided, and Jackie looked up from the glass with damp eyes. "I saw, when you looked in my head. You're like him, aren't you? A Time Lord?"

"I was, when I was alive."

"You knew him."

"I did, for many years."

"You know how to cross between worlds then, don't you?" asked Jackie, and Carissa paused before answering.

"I do. It was my home, your world, before I died and came here."

Jackie grasped Carissa's arm with a thin, veined hand. "Please," she said, her voice soft. "Please. Take me home. I want to see Rose again. When I die — and it won't be long now — take me home with you."

* * *

They stood next to each other, Mickey Smith and Martha Jones, very much alone in the cold metal room. They didn't look at each other — each was too transfixed by the scene before them, two figures fading into blue as if they'd never been. Tears ran down Martha's cheeks; she had never seen anything half as beautiful in her life. Tears pooled in Mickey's eyes; he had, and had forgotten, and would not forget again.

Without even realizing, their hands reached for the other and clasped together, fingers locking together. Their hands fit, comfortable and warm, giving them the strength to remain for the last moments. They waited for the end before glancing at each other, hands clasped together, chests heaving. There was no more to see. They were alone.

Mickey Smith and Martha Jones left Room Negative 27 behind them, and locked the door for good.


	9. Chapter 9

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Nine: Back to the Crossroads**... Rose and the Doctor return to find a TARDIS in pain and a series of distressing messages. It only gets worse from there.

* * *

**Chapter Nine: Back to the Crossroads**

The Doctor hurried back to the TARDIS, not wanting to waste a moment; Rose would rather have gone at a slower pace, considering that they had three children with them now, two of them too small to walk. Dex, luckily, was good and did not complain very much. He carried the small bag which Elizabeth had pressed upon them, and Rose considered it lucky that there hadn't been more than the few beautifully adorned linen baby clothes, though she had no intention of dressing Janie in them. Somewhere in the back of the TARDIS closet, Nina's smallest, more sensible infant clothes waited, and Rose intended to dig them out if the TARDIS had not located them already.

"Doctor," Rose called to him, twenty paces ahead. "Slow down, can't you — Nina's heavy!"

The Doctor turned, but kept walking backwards, holding Janie against his shoulder. "I can take her."

"I don't mind carrying Nina — I just want you to slow down!" Rose caught up to him finally, and studied his face. "You're worried."

"Yes."

"Is it Elizabeth? Or Janie?"

"No, it's..." The Doctor frowned. "Something's wrong. Something isn't right."

"The time lines?"

"No," the Doctor replied. "We've got Janie now — that's meant to happen. The time lines haven't shifted. No...there's something else wrong, right at the back of my head. Can't you feel it?"

"I can," piped up Dex.

Rose frowned as she closed her eyes, pushing out just a bit. "Oh," she said after a moment. "There it is. Like something poking me over and over?"

The Doctor took her hand, entwining his fingers through hers. "I can take Nina, if she's heavy."

Rose shook her head, unwilling to let go of her daughter so quickly. "No. I can keep up." She shifted the girl, ready to start another race, but the Doctor slowed down now, just enough that Rose was no longer too out of breath to talk.

"What will happen to her?" she asked, glancing at the sleeping Janie.

"Mary will die in another six months, and then Elizabeth will be queen."

"Not Elizabeth, you git, Janie!"

He glanced at the baby. If he was trying to look annoyed by the mere presence of Janie, he wasn't being successful. "We know I don't bring her back to see Elizabeth."

"Can we keep her?" asked Dex, nearly skipping beside them. Both of his parents gave him a look.

"Keep her?" echoed Rose, alarmed.

"As I recall, you didn't even want Nina," the Doctor said. "And your mother has her hands full with two of you already."

"But I like Janie."

"As if he doesn't like Nina," the Doctor commented wryly.

"Well, what's gonna happen to her if we don't take her?" demanded Dex. "You can't just leave her somewhere — you promised Elizabeth you'd take care of her."

The Doctor glanced down at the baby in his arms. "I know."

"So you have to keep her," continued Dex, sounding enormously pleased. "Goody."

"Not goody," said the Doctor sharply. "I haven't agreed to anything."

"I think you did, actually," said Rose. "You certainly didn't argue with Elizabeth when she handed the baby over."

He groaned. "I didn't, did I?"

"Nope." Rose grinned at him.

"Do you want another baby on the TARDIS?"

Rose wrinkled her nose and shifted Nina. "I don't know what else we could do. You promised Elizabeth. I suppose we could find a good family to raise her, leave her with them, check on her often–"

"NO," shouted Dex, suddenly darting in front of them and dropping the bag of clothes. Both of the babies were startled awake briefly, and Rose and the Doctor stopped in their tracks, their eyes darting between them and their suddenly stubborn son. "You can't just leave her somewhere. _You promised_."

"Dex," began his father, but Dex wasn't having any of it.

"I won't let you just leave her, like she doesn't matter. She does matter. She's just little, she needs someone, and you took her away from the one person she really wanted. And you can't just leave her with someone else, it isn't fair, she's too scared to make any kind of connection with anyone else, she doesn't want to lose control again, you have to stay near her and help her learn how to use it, like you teach me and Nina, and she's just one more, and there's two of us already, and we've still got all of Nina's baby things, Mummy's been thinking of where the TARDIS put them all, so she can pull them out again, and if you boot her off the TARDIS, I'll never forgive you for the rest of your life, ever _ever_."

"Breathe, Dex," said his father automatically, and Dex took a deep breath and held it, his cheeks bulging out in stubborn refusal to inhale any further.

Rose shook her head. "I think he means it."

"I know he means it," replied the Doctor, watching his son's face turn pink. "He's not even using his respiratory by-pass."

"You'll let him asphyxiate himself?"

"Oh, he'll pass out before any permanent damage is done."

"All right, but I'm not carrying him," said Rose, and the Doctor groaned.

"Dex, breathe, please."

_No!_

The effort of shouting telepathically was almost too much, and Dex's mouth popped open. The Doctor leaned down and picked him up, resting him against his other shoulder, and continued walking.

"It's not fair," said Dex miserably into his father's shoulder.

"It's not easy picking up a third child just like that, you know," the Doctor told him. "Just because we like Janie, doesn't mean that staying with us is the best thing for her. We aren't her parents. Maybe she doesn't want us to be."

"You haven't asked her."

"No, I haven't. But we haven't asked your mother, either, and as she'd be doing quite a bit of the rearing, I think it's only fair her opinion come into it."

"Mum wouldn't mind."

"Oi," said Rose. "I'm capable of telling you what I mind and what I don't."

"It's a choice we'll all make together," said the Doctor.

"No, it isn't," said Dex glumly. "It's a choice you'll make yourself. You won't ask me. You won't ask Janie. You've been talking all this time about what to do with Janie and not once did you say, let's ask her, or let's ask Dex. You're just making plans."

"Dex, if we asked your opinion, we'd be having chocolate biscuits for breakfast every morning," Rose pointed out.

"What's wrong with that?" demanded Dex, turning his head to look at his mother.

"Because you're still growing, and you need more nutrition than chocolate biscuits can give you. So until you choose fruit and cereal over chocolate biscuits, I'm still making that choice for you."

"But that's _breakfast_, this is much more important," said Dex.

"We haven't decided anything, Dex," said the Doctor.

"I think you have. You just don't want to admit it."

"What makes you say that?"

Dex shrugged. "You wouldn't argue half as much if you agreed with me."

The TARDIS was in view now; the Doctor let Dex slide down to the ground, where the boy crumpled, his arms crossing in refusal to walk on his own.

The Doctor pulled the key from his pocket, juggling Janie as he did so, and Rose knelt before her son.

"Dex," she said gently. "Come on, love. Don't you want to come with us?"

"You're going to leave her somewhere," he accused, and Rose sighed.

"I don't know, Dex, but I promise — we won't leave her anywhere she doesn't want to be. Okay?"

The TARDIS door opened, and for a moment, none of them could speak; the sense of fear and exhaustion, as well as a thin undercurrent of pain, overwhelmed them all. The babies instantly woke; Janie began to whimper, but Nina, far more familiar with the TARDIS, broke into a full-fledged howl.

"What...?" began the Doctor, and he leaned over to give Janie to Rose, who found herself comforting not two, but three upset children. Dex attempted to crawl into her lap, wrapping his arms around her waist. She could feel the sudden fear throbbing through both her son and daughter, and she had no doubt that Janie was equally confused and afraid.

The Doctor disappeared into the TARDIS, and the intense feelings that were emanating from the ship slowly ebbed back, still there, but no longer overwhelming. After another few minutes, Rose heard the Doctor shout.

"Rose!"

She wanted to leap up and follow him, but it took her a moment to unwind Dex and climb to her feet with two babies in her arms. By the time she managed to get inside the TARDIS, the Doctor was already under the console, fiddling with the wires and connections.

"Strap the kids in," he ordered. Rose heard the frantic tone in his voice, and immediately went to the car seats which had long since been installed for times when they were needed. "Dex, you, too."

"I can help," insisted Dex, but the Doctor didn't respond, which was an answer in itself. He stomped over to his mother, who had nearly finished strapping Nina into her car seat. Rose gave the baby a kiss and a pat, before turning her attention to her wayward son.

"I need you to hold Janie in your seat with you," she told him. "She's too little to sit in your seat by herself, so I'm going to put the straps over both of you, and it's your job to make sure she doesn't slip out."

"I'm not a baby."

"I never said you were. But if Dad says strap in, he means it. And I can't help him if I've got Janie, so you're going to help me."

Dex looked as though he was about to argue, but a quick glance at his father, hunched over the control panel and emanating the most frightening and intense feelings he'd ever had, seemed to convince the boy not to argue. He settled into his seat and took Janie on his lap, holding her securely while Rose fastened the straps. She gave him a kiss just as the Doctor shouted for her again, and Rose left the children to join him.

"What is it?"

"The strut," said the Doctor quickly. "The crack's been getting worse — I think the damp in the forest might have exacerbated the problem. But that's not the only thing — half of the connectors under the console have been knocked out of alignment, like someone's been playing with them."

"Dex," said Rose, keeping her voice low.

The Doctor glanced at the children before refocusing on the connections. "Yes. I think he may have knocked them somehow when he was operating the TARDIS before."

"That's what's making her so upset, isn't it?"

"I've never felt her this upset," muttered the Doctor, and Rose could hear the worry in his voice, even if she couldn't tell just by the way his thoughts quivered. His hand brushed the paneling, almost a caress, but Rose had long since gotten over any jealousy toward the ship. "It's not just the strut, either, there's something much deeper worrying her. She's not communicating, either — it's why we didn't know something was wrong until we were back."

"Can she still fly?"

The Doctor gave Rose a guarded look. "Yes, but — it'll be rough. And we won't be able to go anywhere else until the repairs are finished — I wanted to take Janie to Martha for a check-up, but the parts I'll need are on Fespa, and it could take a while–"

Rose rested her hand on the Doctor's chest, lightly, and without even thinking, pushed her thoughts over his. She could sense the frantic pace his mind was setting, running in circles, making lists, cross-checking others, spinning so madly Rose wondered how he kept track of anything.

"Doctor," she said gently, and tried to settle her own sense of calm over him. His thoughts did not stop, but his hands did, and one of them left the connections to take hers, wrapping his fingers around her palm. "It's all right. Make the TARDIS better, and we'll all be fine."

The Doctor smiled at her. "You're too good for me."

"Someday you'll catch up," she teased him, and he pulled his hand away to snap the last connection in place.

The console room filled with the resounding and reverberating sounds of bells, whistles, and whoops. The deep ring of the cloisters overpowered all of this, and the Doctor scrambled up with an excited shout.

"Oh yeah!" The Doctor's delight spread across his face, and overcome with relief and excitement, he grabbed Rose and spun her around. Rose was dizzy with laughter when he set her down again, and he fell on the control panel, throwing the levers and dials to mark their destination, before sprinting to the view screen. "Rose, are the kids strapped in?"

"Yes, we're ready."

"Good, we're going as soon as the coordinates are set." The Doctor pulled out the keyboard began typing furiously, when suddenly the blood drained from his face.

"Rose, when did you last check your mobile?"

Rose frowned and dug into her pocket. "This morning — no. Yesterday morning?" She frowned. "That can't be right — I've been ringing Mum much more often than that recently."

The Doctor didn't reply; he simply spun the view screen so that Rose could see it from where she stood, just in time to see the blinking numbers, line after line of missed calls to the TARDIS console room.

The voice of Martha Jones, calm and serious, filled the room. "Doctor, I need you to ring me–"

Martha's voice was overlapped by another voice; that of Sarah Jane Smith. "Doctor, this is Sarah Jane, either you or Rose should ring me soon as you can…."

A third voice. "Doc — this is Jack. Call me."

Martha again, more worried than before. "Doctor? Something's got to be wrong — you've never gone this long..."

Jack. "Doc, Rose, me again. Please call me."

Jack. "Doc, I'm serious. It's about the crossroads."

Jack. "Dammit, Doctor, you can ignore Martha and Sarah Jane, but get your ass back here because something's going wrong with the crossroads."

Rose's eyes widened, staring at the Doctor. Her hearts might have been beating, as she could feel the pumping in her ears, but the entire world was bathed in ice.

"Rose," said the Doctor, "check your mobile."

She had forgotten she held it; Rose flipped it open: six missed calls.

"Martha," said Rose shakily, "and Sarah Jane. And Jack. And..." Her breath caught. "Mickey."

The Doctor snapped to action. He threw the circuitry levers and dials as he set a new destination. Rose stood still, unable to watch him, unable to say a word. She could only stare at her mobile screen, the little blinking light next to Mickey Smith's name, indicating a missed call. She did not wonder why he'd called, though Mickey hadn't rung in years. There was only one reason Mickey could have called her. Rose was almost afraid to look, but she had to do it; she lifted the wrist with her superwatch and pressed the button, and gasped.

"Doctor — it's been five days."

"Rose?"

"For my mother. Five days have gone by for my mother since I rang her last."

The Doctor stopped his frantic work and stood in front of Rose, taking her by the shoulders. "Rose — look at me." She did, eyes full of regret and fear. "We're going to London. As close to the crossroads as I can get."

"But the TARDIS — her strut–"

"Never mind that, Rose. You're going to call your mum from the crossroads. Everything's going to be fine."

"But why would Mickey call unless–"

"No, Rose," said the Doctor firmly. "You must believe me. Everything will be all right."

She nodded, still not believing him, and he gently pushed her to sit on the nearby jump seat before returning to the frantic pace around the console.

For Rose, the moments went by in a haze. She didn't remember the trip, though she felt every whimper and wriggle from the babies on the far side of the room. She watched the Doctor in his solitary motions as if she were watching a faraway dance, appreciating the beauty of his movements but not feeling particularly moved by them. She didn't feel the soft bump of landing, and it was only when the Doctor took her hand and pulled her off the jump seat that she realized they'd arrived at all.

"I'll be back in a moment," the Doctor told the children as he pushed Rose towards the door, and Dex nodded, unable to speak for fear, his lip trembling.

They were in London, just on the edge of the still crumbled remains of Torchwood Tower. The sky was overcast and gray, threatening rain at any moment. A faint blue glow was visible in the center of the ruins, and Rose took several hesitant steps toward it, hardly able to remain upright on the rocky ground.

"Doctor!" she called out, uncertain. "The crossroads — it's glowing."

The Doctor surged ahead of her. "Call your mother," he called over his shoulder. "I'm going to look at the crossroads."

Her fingers shook so badly, Rose wasn't sure how she managed to press the right buttons. With all her heart, she wanted to hear Jackie answer. The phone rang once, and Rose held her breath.

The phone rang a second time, and she closed her eyes in fear.

The phone rang a third time, and when Rose heard the click that signaled a connection, she opened her eyes again, desperately scanning the sky.

It was Mickey Smith who answered. "Rose," he said, and no more. Rose couldn't speak. She closed her eyes again, feeling her shoulders begin to heave, her dual hearts begin to contract. This was different, pain and sorrow doubled. This was worse, a thousand times so, than when she'd stood against the solid white wall in the other Canary Wharf, another lifetime, another body, another world ago.

"Rose," Mickey repeated. "Are you there? Can you hear me?"

"Mickey? It's...Mum, isn't it?" Her eyes were stinging; they were on fire, and she opened them, desperate for cool air. The Doctor was just in view, so close to the crossroads that he was bathed in the blue light, otherworldly and ghost-like.

"I'm sorry, Rose," said Mickey.

Rose's breath caught. "I...how?"

"Two days ago. It was peaceful, Rose. She was asleep, the doctors say she didn't suffer."

Her breath caught. "Two days ago?"

"Yes. I called your mobile."

"There was something wrong with the TARDIS; I never got the messages. I should have thought — I should have been prepared. I knew she was ill, but–"

"It took all of us by surprise, Rose," said Mickey, without being the least bit accusatory.

Rose swallowed, desperately wishing the Doctor would stop scanning the crossroads with the sonic screwdriver and come back to her. "Is — is Pete okay? And the twins?"

Mickey hesitated, and his voice was oddly high when he answered. "Pete?"

"He's got to be devastated."

"Rose...Pete is...god, Rose, I'm sorry. Didn't Jackie ever tell you? I shouldn't be the one to tell you this. Not all of it."

Rose closed her eyes, briefly. "I–"

"The funeral is tomorrow," said Mickey. "They'll be next to each other, by Donald's pond in the back garden. It was what Jackie wanted. She said — she said she talked to you there. She wished she could talk to you one last time, Rose. She loved you so much."

Rose's throat constricted. She had thought there would be tears — but instead, her eyes were dry. Her chest hurt terribly, and her fingers went numb, as though they'd lost all blood flow. She kept her focus on the Doctor, still encased in blue glow, now frowning at the crossroads, and looking around the area.

"Mickey–"

"Rose, I have to go," said Mickey. "I'm sorry. The wake is about to start, and Martha is waiting for me. Call me, when it's over — we can talk then. There's more I have to tell you."

Rose nodded. "Yes. I will."

"Rose...you'll be all right?"

"Oh, me. I'll be fine," said Rose, not sounding fine at all, but the static began to creep into the conversation again, and Rose wanted to scream for the line to keep clear.

"Love you, Rose," said Mickey, and the static took over.

Rose stared at the mobile for a moment, unable to swallow, before looking up to see the Doctor straighten, looking over at her.

"Rose?" he called out.

"Doctor," whispered Rose, unable to speak, and she could sense the purple haze of his thoughts reach toward her, worried. She reached to him, but she was so distraught that she couldn't control the speed, and the moment her turquoise thoughts overlapped with his, the Doctor lost his balance on the rocky ground, and fell — backwards, his arms flailing out, directly into the crossroads, which sparked a brighter blue before closing over him, as if he'd never existed at all.

Rose pushed her mind out as far as she could, desperate to feel something that was the least bit familiar, some sense of the Doctor's comfortable purple self.

There was nothing.

The TARDIS was broken. The children were strapped inside. Her mother was dead. She couldn't call Mickey until the crossroads reset itself, and the Doctor was gone.

The Doctor was gone.

Rose closed her phone, the snap echoing in the sudden expanse of quiet, filled only by the rush of her blood in her ears.

The Doctor was gone.

Rose wrapped her arms over her head, unable to bear the silence, and began to scream.


	10. Chapter 10

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Ten: Along the Doctor's Path**... The Doctor takes a solitary walk on an unfamiliar path. Solitary – but not alone.

**A/N:** Citations are listed at the end of the chapter.

* * *

**Chapter Ten: Along the Doctor's Path**

The path stretched before him, long and winding. Careening over so many hills and twisting along so many valleys, it was impossible for the Doctor to see very far ahead of him. It didn't seem to matter. The view was pleasant, though barren, and as he strolled, he listened to the musical crunch of the gravel beneath his feet.

The gravel was a familiar shade of blue, but the Doctor couldn't place it. The blank and empty desert was familiar as well, but the Doctor couldn't remember seeing a desert like it before. It stretched out to either side of the path, breathtaking to see, somehow repulsive to explore. The Doctor wanted to step right to the edge of the path and gaze out on the wide expanse, to sniff out any sort of life there worth reaching, but his feet kept moving on the path. This lack of control might have worried him once; it didn't seem to matter just then.

There were so many interesting things to see along the path. The landscape offered no respite for his thoughts, but there were plenty of small pathways veering off the true course, dusty and unused, spinning out at haphazard intervals, smaller tributaries spinning into ever smaller trickles. They intrigued him, those other paths; their blue faded but the gravel inviting. He strained to try one, but his feet kept moving, kept marching, refusing to stray. As the Doctor passed by, he couldn't help but feel regret, brief and sharp, somehow knowing he wouldn't be able to return to that lost path again.

The quiet emptiness of the world soothed him. No sound but those of his own thoughts, and the wind whistling around him, ruffling his hair and caressing the back of his neck. The whistles were less like music than like words the Doctor couldn't quite catch — every so often he thought that if he listened very closely, he might understand what the wind tried to tell him.

_We're nowhere. It's as simple as that._

The words came unbidden, not from his head, or the wind, but as if they were encased in the dust at his feet, kicked up as he walked along, and it was only by chance that they reached his ears at all. They were almost familiar, those words, but he didn't know who might have said them, or when, or where, or why.

The Doctor supposed he was the only man who existed in the world, but did not feel the least bit lonely. He felt wrapped in comfort and companionship, as if even now, someone walked the path alongside him. He could not see them; he could not talk to them, or touch them, but there was someone there all the same, not always the same person, but someone or even several someones at once, and he did not feel alone, except in brief snatches while the someones traded places.

The gravel crunched beneath his feet; the Doctor wondered how gravel was so blue. It took a supreme act of will to stop moving, and he knelt to run the gravel between his fingers, quickly coated in blue dust. The smooth, small pebbles ran out of his hand in a tinkling stream. The dust circled and twisted in the wind like smoke, and a cacophony of voices flitted in the air, dissipating in the breeze. There were too many voices to discern any one of them, too many words tumbling to catch any single phrase, but some were repeated, over and over.

_Mmm, what's that…butterfingers…reversed polarity…hello-o-o… Fantastic!_

He licked the dust from a finger. The flavors that burst on his tongue made him grin. He tasted the ice creams and jams and bananas and chocolates of a thousand planets. He felt the velvets and leathers and brocades and hands of a thousand moments. He smelled the pine trees, the spiced apples, the seawater, the roses...

"Rose," said the Doctor suddenly, and his voice echoed in the emptiness, the word rising above him to fill the sky. The wind seemed to laugh at him, echoing the name; the dust swirled around him, repeating it in half a dozen voices. The Doctor stood. "I remember Rose. Where is Rose?"

The path began to spin around him, as though he were the pin and it the wheel, faster and faster until the Doctor could see nothing but a blue blur racing before his eyes. The dizziness rushed over him — he wasn't sure he could last another minute. The dust filled his eyes and nose and mouth, but more so, filled his ears.

_I'm suffering from post-regeneration amnesia, as far as I can remember. _

_I've stopped the universe. Still, they'll never notice. _

_That's a bit undramatic, isn't it? "Belgium"? _

_We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go…_

"_Stop_!" he shouted.

The blue spinning vanished, and the Doctor stood on the path again, but no longer stretched before him — in fact, he seemed to be standing on the very end of it, the blue gravel simply running out just inches past his toes. There was nothing ahead of him except the open expanse of space, the barren desert stretching into infinity, and the Doctor, for the first time on his journey, felt the awful loneliness of time ending, a book closing with a final thud.

"Turn around," whispered the wind in a soft, feminine voice that tickled his memory, and the Doctor did as instructed, to find the pathway which had stretched out behind him — now before him. The empty fear of ending melted away from him, leaving only a trembling anticipation. The world was beginning again; his journey was about to start. Rose was not here; but the Doctor had the sense that he would find her by following the path; Rose was at the end of it.

"Where are you?" he called, answered only by her laughter floating on the wind. His feet were freed, and the Doctor began walking along the path again, following the laughter. He did not stumble, but the dust lifted around him, caking his shoes and coating his trousers, and every so often, a pebble would skip ahead of him, propelled by his shoe, the dust dancing in its wake.

_Planets come and go. Stars perish. Matter disperses, coalesces, forms into other patterns, other worlds. Nothing can be eternal._

He walked for a thousand years, every step a single day, but he did not grow weary. He saw the untried paths as he passed, but felt no urge to examine them. One in particular was strong — inviting and tempting, and the Doctor paused before it, seeing it stretch to the horizon, just as long and friendly as the one he traveled. He thought he could see faded footprints on it, small indentures nearly washed away by time and patience.

_Perhaps I should go home. Back to my own planet. But I can't... I can't..._

In the end, he continued walking, following the laughter, and did not stop again.

He had been going for some time, his thoughts blank save for when the dust gave him words to ponder, when he first saw them: two figures standing in the distance. They appeared to wait for him, and the Doctor picked up his pace. It was as he drew closer that he realized neither figure stood on his path; instead, they waited for him on one of the tributaries. As if in a dream, the Doctor felt he knew them fairly well, but he didn't recognize either of them. He kept his focus on them as he approached, and soon enough was standing opposite them, his hands in his pockets.

They were utterly unlike each other, the two women facing the Doctor. One was younger than the other, but the Doctor would have hesitated to call her young. Despite her smooth face and long black hair, her eyes were as old and ancient as anything else. Her companion was older, her hair gray and thin, the lines on her face giving her a kindly look which her eyes did not match. They were bright and wide, looking around in all directions at once. The two women were equally familiar to him, but even face-to-face, the Doctor could not think of why.

"I know this place," he said, and the younger woman smiled, nodding just a bit. "Rose was here. She described it to me. She walked this path once."

The older woman's eyes lit up. "This is the path Rose took to see me."

The Doctor turned to her, wondering how the woman knew Rose. This was connected to how _he_ knew Rose, and he wasn't even sure yet who Rose was.

"I know you," he said slowly. "Don't I?"

The older woman inhaled sharply and turned to her companion. "He doesn't know me?"

The black-haired woman tapped her chin thoughtfully. "He's forgotten — or at least can't access the memories from here."

"I know you too," said the Doctor. "And you shouldn't be with her — I know that, too. Why do I know that, if I don't know you?"

"Do you know who you are?"

The Doctor scoffed, flapping his overcoat. "Of course, I'm the Doctor!"

"Then what's my name?" challenged the younger woman, and the Doctor nearly laughed, tossing his head back and flapping his coat even more. The dust kicked up around him.

_Yes, that's right, you're going. You've been gone for ages. You're already gone. You're still here. You've just arrived. I haven't even met you yet. It all depends on who you are and how you look at it. Strange business, time._

The Doctor blinked; but neither woman made a move. He wondered if he was the only one who could hear the voices. "Your name?"

"Go on — you knew me once. Name me."

The half smile on her face was familiar — the way her eyes danced, her utter and complete assurance that he would call her by name. He found himself mentally working back on the blue gravel path, turning back the years he'd walked over, and the name came to him, as clearly as a penny dropped in water.

"Carissa." His eyes widened. "Carissa?"

Her wide smiled brightened, and the memories flooded into him. The grin spread across his face, and he took a step toward her, suddenly wanting nothing more than to touch her again, to feel her hand in his. But Carissa took a step back, holding up her hand to stop him.

"No, Doctor," she said quickly. "You can't step off your path."

"My path," echoed the Doctor, and glanced down to where the two paths met, the line where the blue gravel faded into grey. "Is that what this is? Where your path and mine meet?"

"No," replied Carissa. "My path has long since ended — I died when you ended the Time War, and since then I've walked all the alternate paths available to me. I am here to help Jackie on her path."

The Doctor turned rapidly to the other woman. The name seemed to spark something in his memory, drawing a picture of a woman who might have once been the figure standing before him. "Jackie. Jackie Tyler?"

The woman rolled her eyes. "Ah, remembered me at last, did you?"

"Oi, walking an odd blue path here, not exactly in my element, am I?" countered the Doctor, and Carissa laughed.

"No, you certainly aren't. Funny that, since you pulled Rose Tyler through one thirty years ago."

"Rose," breathed the Doctor, and those memories began flooding back as well. "But how do you know Rose, she was years after I last saw you–"

Carissa smiled, but her eyes were sad. "Oh, my Theta — do you think I never watched you? Do you think when we last spoke, it was the last time I saw you? I know you haven't given me much thought in the years since we first saw the crossroads, but I regretted it for years after, that we'd lost such a chance to be happy together."

The name she used gave him an odd thrum, like a musical note that filled his body with a sense of belonging and joy — not in the name itself, but what it represented to him. It wasn't quite the same fit as Doctor, but he could feel that it belonged to him all the same.

Carissa laughed then, recognizing his thoughts. "Not your name — but yes. It is yours, or was once. It isn't my place to call your name any longer. You've given that to another."

"To Rose," said the Doctor, still wondering about _Theta_. "Where is Rose?"

"Home, waiting for you," replied Carissa. "You'll know how to find your way home when it's time to go."

The Doctor frowned. "You — you won't come with me?"

Carissa shook her head. "I can't return to your world, Doctor — I can only walk the other paths. Should I return to the world that belongs to me for any length of time, I would fade."

His hearts tightened just then, and the Doctor swallowed. "Because of me."

She smiled. "It's for the best. I'll walk alongside you — but on a different path."

"How?"

"It's the chance I took, in my last moments — I wanted to see what would have happened, if we'd taken the other path, the day we created a crossroads. Do you remember that day, Doctor?"

"Orbiting Varicose 3," he said slowly, the memory coming to him in snatches. "Your first TARDIS, and we watched the world move with our feet dangling in the dust of creation."

Her smile was wide and beautiful. "Yes. You kissed me, and didn't know what to make of it."

"You didn't reciprocate."

"I did — on the other path," she told him. "And I went back, to see what happened when I chose to return your kiss."

His expression was unreadable; but his hearts beat in an unusual pattern. "What happened?"

Carissa smiled. "Does it matter? I can tell you that you're on the better path."

The Doctor shook his head. "It matters to me."

Carissa closed her eyes briefly, and the Doctor took another step closer to the joining of the paths. Her eyes flew open, as if sensing his nearness, and she reached out with her hands to grasp his temples. "Here, then," she whispered, and let the memories flood into him; he shifted, her fingers unreasonably cold on his skin, and a thin wisp of dust rose between them.

_Love has never been noted for its rationality._

Racing across the galaxies, two steps ahead of the angry Time Lords of the Academy, upset that they'd broken traditions and defied their culture to believe in a foolish thing such as love. Stopping off on Earth as a lark, and deciding to stay for several centuries, just for fun, and averting a few wars in the process, and sending history running off in a parallel direction. Kisses, and caresses, and long languid nights in bed when neither of them bothered to move except to move with each other. The intense sorrow when one would regenerate, the guilty joy of finding pleasure in the new bodies of each other.

The realization, at the end, that it _was_ the end, that he was dying, and then she was alone, again, as always, dying herself on a strange and remote planet, unable to find Gallifrey, unable to find him.

"Some of it was good," the Doctor whispered, and Carissa nodded.

"Some of it," she replied, tinged with sorrow. "But your path–" Her eyes widened. "A son?"

The Doctor pulled away, and Carissa's hands dropped. "He died. On Gallifrey, years ago — you know this."

Carissa shook her head. "I meant your son on Earth. Your son with Rose."

"You mean Dex," interrupted Jackie, and the Doctor took another step backwards, staring at the both of them. The name was familiar to him, but again, he could not place it. "How can you not remember Dex, Doctor? Your own son?"

"He isn't himself yet," explained Carissa, gazing at the Doctor. "He hasn't been named, and I cannot do it for him." She took Jackie's hand in hers. "I need you to do me a very last favor, Doctor."

His eyes refocused on her, still filled with confusion. "Very last? Then — I won't see you again?"

Carissa smiled. "Oh, I hold no illusions that I'll see you again. Not in such a way that we can speak face to face, at least. But for now, you have to return to Rose Tyler. And I would like for you to take Jackie with you."

The Doctor glanced at Jackie. "But — why Jackie?"

"Jackie is Rose's mother," said Carissa gently, and the Doctor inhaled sharply.

"I don't understand."

"There's a lot you don't understand," replied Jackie, the bitterness in her voice not sounding quite as out of place as it might have done once. The Doctor's eyes widened just a bit; he had the sense that Carissa was watching him very closely.

"Then explain it to me."

The older woman sighed, and rubbed her eyes with a hand. "I'm an old woman now, Doctor. I see more clearly than I did when I was younger, and I thought I saw pretty clear then, too. You kept your promise, the one made when I sent you my Rose. You loved her and cared for her, and not a single call ended but I could hear her joy and love in her voice. I know sending her to you was the right thing to do, and it's difficult for me to regret having done it." Jackie looked up at him then, and the Doctor swallowed. "But you see — I never thought, when I sent her to you. I didn't realize that I would be the last to remember her. My children never really knew Rose; she's a phantom to them. Mickey doesn't talk about her, doesn't really think of her any longer. I don't have my daughter, Doctor, in any way that counts for me. I can't hold her in my arms, and there isn't anyone who remembers her as I do."

Jackie laughed, a low, bitter, dry thing. "I think you and I — I understand you now. This must be what you feel like, all those thousand years you've lived. There must be hundreds of people you've met and loved, and you're the only one left who remembers them. You and I, Doctor — it's not just Rose who binds us."

"No," replied the Doctor, his voice low, and he looked at Carissa, whose steady gaze remained focused on him. "It never really was."

He offered Jackie his hand, and she took it, stepping easily from the grey path to his bright blue gravel. The air shimmered around them; she seemed to spring into color, the grey washing her hair to blonde, the dark circles under her eyes fading to pink. Her hand was warm in his, another memory below the surface threatening to rise.

_A straight line may be the shortest distance between two points, but it is by no means the most interesting._

Carissa smiled then, and reached to cup his cheek in her hand. The movement warmed him and seemed familiar, though her face was not the one he expected to see. Her hair was dark, and her eyes were light; he had the idea that Rose was the opposite in every way that mattered. Still, Carissa leaned forward and kissed him, gently, letting her lips settle on his for a moment before pulling away.

"I wish I could regret that the other me took the chance, Theta," she whispered, "but I don't."

"Carissa–"

But she pulled away, out of his reach. "Rose," she reminded him. "Give Rose my love."

Together, the Doctor and Jackie began walking, and did not look back.

* * *

_**The Quotes (in order of appearance):**_

_We're nowhere. It's as simple as that._ — Second Doctor, "The Mind Robber"

_Mmm, what's that…butterfingers…reversed polarity…hello-o-o…Fantastic!_ — "Catchphrases" from Doctors One, Two, Three, Four, and Nine (in that order).

_I'm suffering from post-regeneration amnesia, as far as I can remember._ — Seventh Doctor, "Time and the Rani"

_I've stopped the universe. Still, they'll never notice._ — Fourth Doctor, "The Armageddon Factor"

_That's a bit undramatic, isn't it? "Belgium"?_ — Fifth Doctor, "Time Crash"

_We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go…_ — Ninth Doctor, "Rose"

_Planets come and go. Stars perish. Matter disperses, coalesces, forms into other patterns, other worlds. Nothing can be eternal._ — Sixth Doctor, "The Mysterious Planet"

_Perhaps I should go home. Back to my own planet. But I can't... I can't..._ — First Doctor, "The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve"

_Yes, that's right, you're going. You've been gone for ages. You're already gone. You're still here. You've just arrived. I haven't even met you yet. It all depends on who you are and how you look at it. Strange business, time._ — Seventh Doctor, "Dragonfire"

_Love has never been noted for its rationality._ — Seventh Doctor, "Delta and the Bannermen"

_A straight line may be the shortest distance between two points, but it is by no means the most interesting._ — Third Doctor, "The Time Warrior"


	11. Chapter 11

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Eleven: Using Only Eleven Words**... He once asked for eleven words. That's all, just eleven. She's had seven years to think of them.

* * *

**Chapter Eleven: Using Only Eleven Words**

It was lonely, at first — maddening, really, if truth be told — the utter emptiness in her mind where the Doctor used to take residence. She hadn't realized the expanse of him when he was there, how he'd filled her thoughts and pushed the boundaries to touch his own. Now, with him gone, her mind stretched in countless directions, with her own small monologue echoing in cavernous rooms. Rose wondered how the Doctor stood it, the empty space that had occupied his head for so many years, previously filled with cousin after cousin, the noisy reverberations of the millions of thoughts of countless Time Lords, all struggling to be heard over the cacophony of each other. She often wondered how he'd managed to find his sense of self in the din; now she wondered how he'd kept his mind in the silence.

There had been days during their years together, of course, in which she hadn't seen the Doctor, but not many. Either he was captured, or she was captured. Jack might have needed his help in a very dangerous situation, or Sarah Jane had pneumonia and the Doctor had to stay with the children while Rose cared for her.

Even with this, Rose hadn't gone a full 24 hours without some sort of contact, even so much as a brief touch of his mind to hers, and the lack of this comfort was worse than anything else.

Five and a half hours, he said to her once. That was the first time, on the strange ship in the 51st century. The second time had been five years. Rose thought she'd give him at least that much.

He'd asked for eleven words once, just before they became lovers. Eleven words in which she had to tell him what she wanted. She'd never really given him an answer, except jokingly about the fate of prawn mayo sandwiches. While Rose waited for him to appear, she thought about those eleven words, sorting through the previous seven years to find the right combination of wanting and needing.

_Faith_, that was a good word. He would come back to her; she was sure of it. She clung to her faith with aching fingers.

When the first five and a half hours had passed, it was nearly nightfall. The London skyline was already lit against the dusky blue sky, and for the first time, Rose noticed the rigging erected over the ruins of Torchwood Tower, in order to keep the site lit even in the dark of night. Rose stood, her knees shaking just a bit, and she steadied herself before setting off to find Captain Jack. It hurt to leave the crossroads behind; she didn't want to turn her back on it, but every step gave her some degree of strength, a sort of comfort in knowing it was all right to go on.

Captain Jack waited for her just outside the TARDIS, where he was flanked by several of his staff, reading reports and leaning back on his chair. He glanced up as Rose approached, and wordlessly handed the reports to the nearest person before standing and enveloping Rose in a hug. He'd been there when she'd woken from her screams; he'd held her as she sobbed and railed, and he had sat her down beside the crossroads and talked softly to her until he was certain she wouldn't dive in after the Doctor.

Rose wasn't sure how he had known to be there, but it was the most natural thing in the world for him to appear at the crossroads when she needed him most. Jack had set a perimeter around the site, around Rose, so that she could remain undisturbed. He had found the children, soothed them, sent them somewhere else.

Most importantly, Jack had trusted her, and left her to sit alone and wait for the Doctor. Jack trusted that Rose would look for him when she was ready.

_Friendship_, thought Rose, her cheek pressed against the buttons of his shirt. But more than that — there was something the Doctor's companionship gave her that Jack could never provide, for all that he was good, and reliable, and willing to stand guard over her for as long as she needed. Friendship was only the beginning of it, thought Rose.

"The children?"

"With Sarah Jane," Jack replied. "Torchwood has a flat not far from here, we've sent them there. It's more comfortable for the babies. Dex didn't much want to leave."

"He wouldn't."

"I can give you a key."

"I'll come back."

"Never doubted it. Rose—"

She looked up at him, wearily, the dark circles already forming below her eyes. It was clear she did not much want to wait to hear what he would say.

"I don't know, Jack. I don't understand any of it."

"Do you know when you are?"

Rose blinked. "No."

"You're in 2014, Rose. The best we can figure, you're about one month shy of when you left the parallel world seven years ago. We're about to catch up to you, Rose."

Rose began to tremble. "Oh, God."

"We've been monitoring the readings from this area for the last three months. The readings spiked when the Doctor — well, they've settled now, but they're still high. We'll keep watch. I don't think it's over."

She nodded, barely able to look him.. "The one place you said we shouldn't go — I don't know why–"

"I don't think you were given a choice," he replied, grim.

She refused the car Jack offered, and walked the few blocks to the flat, fingering the heavy keys in her pocket. She wondered what would happen, when the door opened and the children saw her without their father close behind. She hadn't seen them since they'd landed; she didn't know what Jack or Sarah Jane had told them. Until Jack had said her name, Rose hadn't realized Sarah Jane was there, and she knew that once she saw the kindly older woman, Rose would be filled with gratitude, but for now, could only feel her weariness and sorrow, and a slow burning trepidation with every step that led her to where her children waited.

Visions of a row of anxious childish eyes vanished as soon as Rose opened the door. The sounds of laughter and the smell of curry filled the flat, spilling into the hall, and Rose stood for a moment, unnoticed, drinking it in like honey.

"Mummy!" shouted Dex from somewhere deep in the flat, and the little boy flew around the corner in stockinged feet, sliding on the parquet floor directly into Rose's legs. "Aunt Sarah Jane let us order _vindaloo_."

Rose leaned over and picked up her son, warm and solid, and he wrapped his legs around her waist and his arms around her neck, squeezing her tightly. He smelled of little boy, of damp forest and bananas, and she breathed him in deep, closing her eyes.

_Solace_. That was another good word, Rose thought, feeling Dex nuzzle into her.

"Mummy?" whispered Dex. "Are you hungry? Or are you too sad to eat?"

"I'm not sad," lied Rose. It was clear from the unchanging concern in Dex's eyes that he didn't believe her.

"Okay. But are you hungry?"

Rose gave her son a kiss on his cheek. "I'm not hungry."

Dex studied her, solemn as could be. "Can I be hungry?"

Rose laughed. "What a question, Dex, of course you can be hungry."

"I wasn't sure, because Dad isn't here," said Dex, and Rose's hearts went cold. "If you're not hungry, maybe I'm not either."

"You be hungry if you want, Dex," said Rose carefully, trying not to cry, and she let Dex slide back down to the ground. "You can't miss vindaloo, can you?"

But Dex didn't immediately run back down the hall; instead, he gave his mother an oddly knowing look. "He'll come back."

Rose couldn't say anything for a moment. The knot in her throat threatened to choke her.

"It's only he needs a little time," continued Dex. "But he'll come back."

_Trust_. Oh, how this word rang true, how this more than any other was difficult for Rose, though it flowed through Dex as easily as breathing. Such an evasive, tangible thing, was trust. Rose craved it for them both.

"Go eat your vindaloo," said Rose finally, and Dex scampered off, leaving Rose alone in the entryway for a moment. She heard Dex's voice again, and Sarah Jane answered. Rose knew it would be only a matter of minutes before Sarah Jane came to look for her, and she briskly wiped her eyes and felt her cheeks, blistering hot to her too-cold fingers. She covered her face with them, hoping they might cool the heat beneath her eyes, and took several deep breaths.

Instinctively, she reached out, looking for the familiar purple glow of the Doctor's thoughts, and found only the green of Dex, and the pink of Nina, both familiar and loved, but not what she wanted. She could sense the small peach thoughts of Janie as well, slumbering somewhere nearby.

"Rose?"

Rose lowered her hands; Sarah Jane stood in the entryway now, looking calm and centered, and infinitely reliable. She wore a tea towel over one shoulder; Rose was never so glad to see her as she was right then.

"Hello," said Rose, and covered her face again.

"I put Janie down to sleep just a bit ago; Nina's very tired but I think she was waiting for you. If you want to put her down and then join us for dinner, I can keep Dex from eating all of the vindaloo."

"Yes," said Rose. The normal trappings of a day fell down on her shoulders, and for a moment, Rose felt claustrophobic. She wondered what Sarah Jane would do if she were to turn and run straight back to the crossroads.

"Lovely, Nina's just around the other corner, playing with some blocks. You'll find us in the kitchen when you're ready."

Sarah Jane didn't wait for an answer; she slipped away from the entryway just as quietly as she slipped in, and Rose took another moment before turning the opposite corner to find Nina in deep concentration in front of a tower of brightly-colored blocks. The baby took a single look up at her mother, and dropped the block in her hand, reaching up to be held.

Rose lifted her daughter, holding her close and breathing in the baby scent of her, letting the soft pink thoughts envelop her own. Nina was tired, and the moment she was cradled in Rose's arms, she yawned widely and closed her eyes to sleep.

Rose followed Janie's thoughts into the back of the flat, into a tiny bedroom with a single crib, wedged in between the wall and a wide bed. Rose sat on the bed, wondering if Nina was hungry at all; it had been hours since the baby had last fed, and the thought seemed to wake the girl briefly, because Nina's eyes opened and she began to whimper, opening and closing her fists.

"Oh, all right," said Rose, mocking her own typical response of feigned exasperation at her daughter's continual demand for food, and she fumbled with her jumper for a moment. Rose kept her eyes on Nina's face as she fed, stroking the soft cheek and the blonde curls, watching as the baby's eyes slowly closed and her stomach filled.

_Intimacy_. Another word, a different connotation than the sort she felt now, but still, a good word. Rose didn't even mean the physical sort, although that was part of it — it was the way Nina's mind curled into hers, close and comforting, the way they shared their thoughts and feelings without words. It was looking into her daughter's eyes, knowing what went on behind them, without doubt.

It wasn't long before Nina was so deeply asleep, she wasn't even pretending to suckle, and Rose pulled her away, refastening her clothing. She rubbed Nina's back, watching her child sleep and loving her as much as she could in those quiet moments before returning to the kitchen and the noisy questions of her son and her friend.

Nina was dreaming; Rose could tell, just by the fluttering of her eyelids, and the rapid spinning and turning of her thoughts. She could only catch the dreams in fits and snatches, but the one constant seemed to be the presence of a tall, dark-haired man in a brown pinstriped suit who laughed and tossed her in the air, and smelled of time and honey and wool and bananas.

"Oh, Nina," breathed Rose. "Oh, my love."

She simply held her daughter, unwilling to put the child down just yet. But the smells of curry were reaching even the bedroom, and Rose laid the baby next to Janie, so deeply in sleep, she did not even notice her bedmate's arrival. To Rose's surprise, the little girls almost instinctively reached over and took each other's hands, continuing their slumber, and Rose watched them for a moment, reaching to touch Janie's small head, before leaving them to their rest.

_Whole_, thought Rose, closing the door behind her. Jackie had called them a pair, she and the Doctor. She felt lost, without him near, her heart cleaved in two. A good word, whole.

Dex, much to Rose's relief, did not bring up the whereabouts of his father again. Instead, he talked happily about the journey to the zoo, where he had gone with Sarah Jane and the babies. They'd watched the otters swim laps in the pool, and the camel had spit at them in a long stream, and the nice zookeeper lady showed a hawk in flight. Dex had had a marvelous time, even if there hadn't been a proper dragon, and dearly wanted to go again, with hopes of riding the elephant.

"I'm fairly certain elephant rides aren't permitted, Dex," said Sarah Jane, much amused.

"I saw a picture," insisted Dex. "You can't show a picture of it if it isn't true. Mummy, we can go to the zoo tomorrow, can't we? Please?"

"If Sarah Jane likes," replied Rose, and Dex groaned and slumped in his seat.

"Luke will be up on the morning train," said Sarah Jane, never missing a beat. "You can go after lunch."

Dex sighed happily and tucked into the rest of his vindaloo, legs swinging. "Luke will take me to the zoo," he said, entirely confident of Luke's opinion on the matter.

It wasn't until after Rose tucked Dex into the large bed next to the crib that she found herself alone in the small sitting room, knees tucked under her chin. Sarah Jane was reading Dex his bedtime story, and Rose could dimly hear her voice going through the twisted and complicated words of Dr Seuss while Dex giggled away. Rose gazed out the window onto a perfect view of London; familiar landmarks etched in gold against a darkly blue sky rimmed with stars. The streets were awash with red and green, and if Rose craned her neck, she could just make out the glowing lights illuminating the remains of Torchwood Tower, and at the very edge of it, the TARDIS standing guard.

_Shelter_. Not from life or from harm, but the safe place to which Rose could return, knowing him so well as she did. He was the Storm, but she was the Eye in his center; in his arms, she was safe.

Rose left the sofa and pressed her cheek to the glass, straining to see the site, wondering if she could make out the blue glow of the crossroads in the center. She never heard Sarah Jane come in.

"Lovely, isn't it?" The older woman's voice caught Rose by surprise, and Rose pulled away from the glass. "Only there's such fuss now, about wasting electricity and unused lights causing spillage. I suppose there's something to that — Luke is always on about leaving lights on, saving the planet and such. I think it's something he learnt in school."

"I'm sorry you had to leave him."

"I'm not. A holiday is just what I needed, and Luke is very capable on his own. It's not so far, at least — just the other side of London. And I'm rewarded with such a view!" Sarah Jane joined Rose at the window and sighed with pleasure. "Now, Rose Tyler, look on that and tell me a prettier sight exists in the universe. Go on!"

Rose looked out again. She could see, superimposed over nighttime London, the ghostly, blurred reflections of herself and Sarah Jane. She thought they might have been reversed in the glass; it was Sarah Jane who looked fresh and young, while Rose herself felt ancient and tired of life.

"Would you like me to ring Martha?"

Rose stiffened. "I — ah, no. Not yet. We thought to take Janie to her, but now–"

Sarah Jane nodded. "You'd rather keep her close."

It took a moment before Rose understood, and she turned away from the glass. "Oh — not that. I meant, to see Martha as a doctor. Janie is — not exactly human, she's a Chamalien, and the Doctor thought–"

The words faded from Rose's lips. It had slipped out so easily, the Doctor in past tense, as though he truly belonged to a time long since gone by, and Rose tensed suddenly, her eyes wide with fright.

_Enduring_. Was that too much to ask, for something to remain constant throughout the centuries, unchanging, unremitting, unvaried? Their very relationship had changed over the course of their life together; wouldn't it stand to reason they would change with it? And yet — Rose wanted it, she wanted this one small part of him to remain hers, hers alone, fixed in time and never altered, that he would be there, simply there.

Sarah Jane wrapped her arms around Rose in an instant, and led her back to the sofa again, sitting them both down. Rose clung to her, shivering violently, and Sarah Jane waited. When Rose at last pulled up, Sarah Jane pretended not to notice the damp tears already drying on her blouse.

"Anyway," continued Rose. "Martha would kill me, if she knew I'd lost him."

"Not lost," corrected Sarah Jane. "Tell me about Janie. I do love your son, but he is the most abysmal storyteller I have ever met."

"What did he tell you?"

"Some sort of nonsense about dragon eggs and a princess named Elizabeth."

Rose laughed, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. "He's half right."

"I'm afraid of which half now. Oh — wait. I think we'll need something." Sarah Jane jumped up from the sofa and disappeared into the kitchen, returning in a moment with two wine glasses in one hand and two bottles of red in the other.

"Sarah Jane!"

"And a corkscrew in my pocket," she said triumphantly.

"I can't possibly drink an entire bottle myself."

"You can and you will. It's entirely medicinal, and I'll help. Now, be a love and hold those–" Sarah Jane handed her the glasses, before setting the extra bottle on the table. She fished the corkscrew out of her pocket and quickly uncorked the bottles. "One to breathe, and one to hang the breathing."

"You could have opened them earlier."

"And have Dex demand a taste? A four-year-old Time Tot is one matter. A four-year-old Time Tot drunk on red wine is another entirely. I do wonder, sometimes — if either of my Doctors had had children, would they have been as exuberant as Dex, or would they have been such carbon copies of that form of their father? The things I wonder late at night. Perhaps the wine is extraneous." Sarah Jane handed Rose a glass, filled to the brim. "Now, drink up, and tell me about Janie."

"It begins with you, really."

"Me?"

"Dex thought he could pilot the TARDIS, and I suppose he said something to you about it."

Sarah Jane began laughing. "Oh, I remember that conversation. I don't dare disbelieve anything that boy tells me."

"He didn't think so, apparently, and decided to prove you wrong." Rose took a sip of the wine for courage, and began to tell the story, pretending not to notice when Sarah Jane continued to refill her glass, or when the lights outside the window began to blink out as the night went on. She dragged the story out as long as she could, both dreading the end as well as the questions which would undoubtedly follow. Rose knew Sarah Jane never did anything without purpose, and there was certainly purpose to getting completely smashed before the night was over. Rose didn't dare think what would come when the story ended.

It was while she recounted Dex's stand-off on the way back to the TARDIS that Sarah Jane began laughing again. Rose stopped, unsure what had caused Sarah Jane's mirth, and not certain after so many glasses of wine (because there were now three bottles on the table, and two were empty) that something wasn't truly funny.

_Joy_, thought Rose, watching Sarah Jane laugh. In the simple things, really, the way something would tickle both of them the same way, the look of moonlight on a dragonfly's wing, the way their eyes would meet over the squabbling noise of the breakfast table.

"Do you know, Dex said something to me this afternoon. I thought it quite odd at the time, but now I think I understand it completely. He wanted to know if humans ever had more than one wife."

"Goodness, why?"

"Wait for it. I told him some do, but I don't hold with such things. He grew quite thoughtful, really, and said he supposed, as he is partially human, he ought to follow those customs when it comes to marriage, as there was no such thing on Gallifrey, not really."

"True enough. But why?"

"Wait for it! I agreed with him, that it would be a fine thing to follow his mother's traditions in this regard, and keep only one wife, if he thought it best. He said he really did, and then he said, sounding as mournful as you please, that he had something quite awful to tell me, and perhaps I should sit down, and try to brace myself and be very brave.

"So I found a bench, and faced him, poor little miserable mite, and there by the giraffes, Dex said to me, 'Aunt Sarah Jane, I am very sorry, but I can't marry you any longer.' "

"He didn't!"

"He did!"

"He's wanted to marry you for ages!"

"And I tell you, Rose, I was torn between hysterical laughter and supreme disappointment. The only thing keeping me from the former was the look of pure agony on the lad's face, and the only thing keeping me from the latter was the thought of the Doctor as a father-in-law."

Rose grinned, despite the flash of sorrow which accompanied his name. "Poor Sarah Jane. Did Dex break your heart?"

Sarah Jane topped off Rose's glass by way of reply. "Now, of course I put on my sorriest face, and said to him how very sad I was to hear it, but if he thought it best, then obviously it was right. And he patted my knee and said, 'Aunt Sarah Jane, you must know, it isn't because I don't love you anymore. It's because you don't need me as much as Janie does.' "

"Janie!" exclaimed Rose.

"The very same thing I said. Dex nodded, oh so solemn, and went on. 'She needs someone, Aunt Sarah Jane, and her first mother abandoned her, and she had to leave her second mother, and she doesn't want to lose me, too. And she's only little, Aunt Sarah Jane, and she trusts me.' "

_Respect_, thought Rose. It was there, it had to be there, for her son to have learned it so young, to have enough courage to do a very difficult thing because it needed to be done, because it was the right thing to do.

"Well," said Rose, resting her chin on her hand.

" 'But, Dex,' I asked him, 'do you love her?'

"And he looks at me, with the Doctor's eyes, quite large and honest, and says to me, 'I think I will, Aunt Sarah Jane.' "

"Thown over by an infant in nappies," said Rose with wonder.

But Sarah Jane shook her head. "I don't think so. I watched him the rest of the day, Rose, and I wasn't sure then, but after what you told me he said in the forest, I'm sure of it now. I think Dex lied to spare my feelings. I think he loves her already. There is something about the way he interacts with that baby, it reminds me of you and the Doctor in a complicated dance only you can follow, answering questions before they're asked, fetching cups of tea before you're thirsty."

Rose laid her head on the back of the sofa, very still, and Sarah Jane began to curse the easy tongue the wine had given her. She set the glass down on the table and reached to take Rose's shoulder, but Rose lifted her head before Sarah Jane grew near. Tears streamed down her face, but her voice was strong.

"Sarah Jane, I salute you," she said, lifting her glass, her hand shaking only a little. "You are a better woman than I."

"Rose–"

Rose shook her head. "Today, I lost my mind, my mother, and my Doctor. I have my mind back, which I cannot but think is a good thing. My mother I'll never see again, but I've known that for years, only today it's real. And the Doctor — Dex says he'll come back when it's time. If you believe Dex loves this baby, Sarah Jane, what choice do I have not to believe my son in this too?"

_Love_.

"Exactly so," said Sarah Jane softly, taking up her own glass again, and together the women drained them dry.

So ended the first day without the Doctor. As she fell asleep in the large bed, Dex snuggled comfortably warm next to her, Rose wondered how many more there would be.


	12. Chapter 12

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Chapter Twelve: Just Around the Corner**….. There are a thousand blue gravel paths, each with its own journey. They lead a thousand places, each with its own story. The right blue gravel path will bring you home.

* * *

**Chapter Twelve: Just Around the Corner**

Rose hadn't really expected the Doctor to return in five and a half hours. After all, he'd done that once before. For the same reason, she felt confident that she wouldn't wait five years, either. This left her with waiting for days, weeks, or months. When five and a half days passed, she curled up in the bed she'd shared with him on the TARDIS and sobbed, despondent and unresponsive, her limbs so heavy and her hearts so weak, it was two days before she was able to stand.

Over the next few weeks, life settled into a routine. She visited the crossroads, often alone, sometimes with the children, while Jack and the Torchwood staff worked around her, carefully cleaning up the flotsam and jetsam of Torchwood Tower. Jack claimed that the area was set to be used for some kind of government building, but Rose suspected he merely wanted to remain near, in case she did something stupid like leap into the crossroads after the Doctor.

Sometimes, Rose found herself helping them, trying to catalog the odd things they dug out from under the blocks of concrete and ash. Sometimes she recognized souvenirs from far-off worlds. Sometimes she was stumped. But most of the time, they left her well enough alone.

Every night, she returned to the flat exhausted, both mentally and physically. Every night, Dex patted her hand, and said as he fell asleep, "Maybe tomorrow."

It was his complete confidence that let her wake up in the morning. She automatically felt for the other body in the cool bed, and every morning, found nothing at all.

On the morning of the third day of the sixth week, Rose woke and did not immediately reach for the Doctor. She showered and dressed and joined the rest of the family in the kitchen, where Sarah Jane was feeding Nina her breakfast, one careful spoonful at a time. Janie shouted in joy to see Rose, and threw her bottle at Rose, as was customary.

Rose caught it, as was not.

"Oh, good eye," said Sarah Jane admiringly. "I think that's a first."

"It is," said Rose with no small amount of wonder.

"Fancy raspberries for your cereal?"

"Raspberries?" echoed Rose, handing the bottle back to Janie, who immediately popped it in her mouth.

"I picked them up yesterday. They're lovely and tart. I thought the children would like them with cream."

"Nina won't, she hates raspberries," said Rose automatically, leaning over to give the suspiciously silent Dex a kiss.

"Nonsense, she's eaten most of her bowl already. Mashed with banana, of course, and she hasn't made a peep in protest."

Rose stood up, peering into the bowl Sarah Jane held — sure enough, a faintly gleaming pink goo rested there, nearly gone, and Sarah Jane gave Nina another spoonful of the stuff. The baby dutifully swallowed, and Rose leaned over to took her daughter in the eyes.

"Nina," said Rose, "since when did you start eating raspberries?"

Sarah Jane dropped the spoon in the bowl. "She's not allergic, is she?"

Rose shook her head. "No — but she's always refused them before. She'd spit them out on the Doctor when we tried to feed them to her."

Sarah Jane made a sort of humming sound, and scraped another spoonful, which Nina ate with gusto. Rose tapped her cheek, thinking.

"Mummy," interrupted Dex, bouncing his spoon against his bowl. "Can I come with you today?"

Rose didn't want to be distracted. "Goodness, Dex, I thought today was paddleboats with Luke."

Dex shrugged, nearly flinging his spoon across the table. "It's okay. I can do them later."

"It will be very boring."

"I don't think so," replied Dex, and the spoon flew out of his hand and clattered against the cereal box, which was knocked over, spilling out over the floor. By the time the mess was cleaned up, Rose had forgotten to ask what her son meant.

Today seemed like a good day, Rose thought as she followed Dex to the crossroads. He skipped ahead of her, joyful to be outside and free, but Rose went at a more leisurely pace. The sky was overcast, and the weather reports had been full of dire news of rain in the north, but the air was crisp and cool on Rose's skin, and she felt lighter than she had in weeks. The helicopters hung low in the sky and a gentle breeze lifted Rose's hair off her neck. She barely noticed the man walking by her in a pinstripe suit; she was only momentarily distracted by the couple on the corner discussing the latest play running at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.

It was the travel agency on the corner that made her stop, briefly, to look at a poster advertising cheap airfare to Barcelona.

"Mummy!" shouted Dex, nearly a block ahead of her. Rose pulled her eyes away from the poster, and hurried to catch up. "We'll be late."

"Late for what?" asked Rose, reaching for his hand.

"Uncle Captain Jack is waiting!" Dex pulled his mother along, and as soon as they neared the worksite, he dropped his mother's hand to race ahead to where Jack waited for them. Rose watched as Jack caught Dex mid-stride, swinging the boy into the air. By the time Rose caught up with them, Dex hung upside-down by his ankles, and Jack wore the expression of a man who enjoyed tormenting four-year-olds in his spare time.

"I thought I told you, no kids under four in the workplace," Jack said to Dex, and the little boy screeched.

"I'm four!"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes!"

"I hear tell you're one month shy."

"That was a month ago!"

"Oh, my mistake." Jack lowered Dex to the ground, where the boy lay on his back, giggling uncontrollably.

"He insisted," apologized Rose.

"You caved."

"Same thing."

"There's coffee in the caravan."

"I'm all right for now. Dex–"

"Stay out of trouble," sang Dex, an old familiar refrain, and he rolled to his stomach. "Uncle Cap'n Jack, can I break your wrist?"

"No, and stop talking to the guards, they'll only fill your head with nonsense."

"They taught me how to do it."

"I'm sure they did."

"And how to identify cars fifty meters away, and how to tell when someone's lying, and I bet I can flip you over on your back too."

"Dex!" scolded Rose. "You're not supposed to bother them when they're working."

"I'm not bothering them, they said they're training me. They said I'll make a good policeman one day."

Jack shrugged and grinned at Rose. "Well, I suppose it's better than calling him the Bicycle Repairman, isn't it?"

Rose laughed, but Dex wasn't letting up. "Uncle Captain Jack! I can hold my breath longer than you can!"

"I'm sure of it."

"That's not how it works — you're supposed to _challenge_ me!" wailed Dex, and Rose left the two of them to entertain each other as she went to find the crossroads.

"Oi, Rose!" called out Gwen Cooper, her long hair falling into her face. "Help me with this bit of concrete, could you?"

Rose trotted over. "What's this, then?"

"Part of the old library," Gwen explained. "Mess of books lying about, maybe you'd recognize some of the languages?"

"I'm not that good at them," said Rose, but she helped them shove the concrete a few inches over, just enough to reach several dozen books below. One fell at her feet, and Rose leaned over to pick it up, her eyes automatically scanning the words before she could stop them.

_It was then that Queen Victoria found herself with the two mysterious strangers. They seemed just as intrigued by the werewolf as they were the charge of keeping the queen safe. Indeed, though they sped the Queen to safety, in the moments between stark terror, they laughed and embraced, continually near each other, until at last the small party consisted of only the Queen herself, the man known as the Doctor, and the small near-naked child._

Rose went still, the book glued to her hand. She could hear the others moving around her, oblivious to her distress. Part of her wanted to burst into laughter. The rest wanted to cry. Instinctively, she looked over to the crossroads, still glowing faintly blue, but otherwise unchanged.

Only….

Rose walked towards it, her knees shaking, clutching the book in her hand. She stared so hard at the crossroads that she forgot to blink, and nearly lost her footing several times before she reached it. She fell to her knees and held her breath, not daring to make a sound.

There — for it had grown louder with every step she'd taken — a hum in the back of her mind, still growing louder though she was no longer moving. Rose could hear it, every moment more certain.

"Dex!" she shouted suddenly, knowing why he'd come with her that day, what he'd meant in the kitchen. "Dex!"

The boy came running, stumbling over the debris but never falling. "Is he coming?" he shouted, and ran into his mother with a thump. He strained forward to the crossroads, and Rose wrapped her arms around him, partially to hold him back, and partially to keep herself from leaping in.

"Do you hear the hum?" she whispered in his ear, and he nodded, so excited he vibrated. "That's Dad — that's the part of us he carries with him on the other side."

"He's close, isn't he?" Dex whispered back. "Is he coming?"

Rose couldn't answer. She squeezed Dex tightly, resting her chin on his shoulder, eyes focused on the box. There were footsteps approaching behind her: Jack. She wondered what the sensometers were picking up right then.

"Mummy," urged Dex.

"I don't know what to do," Rose whispered. "I don't know how to bring him home."

"Dad!" shouted Dex, and the crossroads rippled. The humming became stronger. Rose's eyes went wide. "_Dad_!" shouted Dex again, and the rippling began anew, as if someone had given it a punch. The humming grew louder still.

Rose tried to speak, but the knot forming in her throat was too tight. "Doctor," she managed, and though her voice was so soft she could barely hear it, the rippling intensified, kept going, and the humming was near deafening. Hope renewed, Rose pulled every last bit of energy into the single word: "_Doctor_!"

When the hand appeared at the center of the blue, thin and coated in custard, Rose didn't even stop to think. She reached forward, past her son, and took it.

And _pulled_.

The air was filled with shouts and orders, but Rose didn't hear them. The skies opened as the rain which had threatened all morning began to fall, washing the blue custard that coated them away into the ground, but Rose didn't feel it. The scent of firecrackers and soot enveloped them, but Rose could smell only the honey-wool scent of him, lying comatose on the ground before her. Jack and Gwen and Ianto Jones circled them, scrambling for blankets and moving aside the larger bits of concrete, but Rose saw only _him_, lying before her, his mouth slack and his eyes closed, and his hair stuck damply to his face. His hand was still in hers, and his other hand….Rose followed it, almost reluctantly, to see it holding the hand of a nearly-transparent woman, blonde and full-figured, and she nearly lost her breath.

"Mum?"

Jackie Tyler blinked her eyes open, still clutching the Doctor's other hand. She looked around her, not quite believing where she was, before settling her gaze back on her daughter. "Rose."

"Mum." Rose let go of the Doctor's hand then, and covered her mouth. It hurt to look at her mother, to be able to see straight through her, to where the crossroads still rippled as the rain struck. The rain went through Jackie too, not quite clinging to her, and Rose wondered if she was dreaming. "Is it you?"

Jackie nodded, and Rose did not think about transparency or impossibility. The idea that her mother was anything less than corporeal never crossed her mind — she was _there_, and Rose fell into her mother's arms, feeling the familiar warmth of Jackie's arms wrap around her. She could feel the whisper of Jackie's hair brush against her cheek, and smell the soap that Jackie always used. The only thing Rose couldn't feel was a heartbeat beneath her mother's breasts, but that didn't matter just then.

"Mickey said you were dead," whispered Rose, clinging to her mother.

"A little thing like death stop me?" scoffed Jackie. "When the last thing I wanted to do in this world or any other was to hold you? And here you and I sit — oh, let me look at you."

Rose sat up, scooting closer to her mother, keeping her hands on her mother's arms. She didn't dare let go. Jackie's cheeks glistened, and Rose felt her own cheeks grow damp, but while she was certain to look like a sunburnt and wayward child, her mother looked radiant and glowing, her smile shining like silver. Jackie leaned forward and wiped Rose's damp cheeks with one hand.

"Two children, and this thin? Doesn't the Doctor feed you anything?"

"How are you here?"

"Is that any way to greet your mother?"

"Mickey said–"

"Oh, Mickey's a man, and he's so besotted over his Doctor Jones right now, he wouldn't know Tuesday from a tree. I came with the Doctor, didn't I? I met him on the path, and he brought me to you."

"What path?"

Jackie smiled. "Don't you remember? You walked it once, to find me, when you were alone and afraid. We sat near Donald's pond in the garden and talked."

"You're buried there," said Rose, and Jackie nodded.

"Next to Pete, yes. The twins threw fits when I put him there, but that where I wanted to be, more than anything, in the same spot where I last saw you."

"Mum — why didn't you tell me, when Pete died last year?" Rose's voice nearly broke, and Jackie clucked, pulling her back again.

"What could you have done, Rose? I knew you'd be sorry — I knew you'd want to come back. I couldn't let you do that."

"But if you needed me–"

"Rose–" Jackie pushed Rose back up again, and looked her in the eyes. "You couldn't. I had to die, to come here. Even then, I needed help. I can't ever go back — and I can't stay." She lifted the hand that still clung to the Doctor. "The moment I let go, I'll slide back onto the path that brought me here. He's the anchor that holds me." Jackie laughed. "Yours, too, not so plain."

Rose took her mother's other hand. "There's so much I never told you — that I wanted to tell you — and there's never time to tell it."

"Are you my gran?"

Jackie looked away from Rose, perhaps the first time she had done so since her arrival. Dex stood next to his mother, unafraid and curious, and Rose felt a surge of love for her son, who had surely known his father was returning, surely known where he needed to be that day.

"I am," replied Jackie. "You're quite big, aren't you?"

"I'm _four_."

Jackie clucked. "Is that all? I thought you were five."

"Soon," said Dex, and Rose could tell he was already wondering if he could get away with such a claim. "Why are you here?"

"To see your mother — I couldn't go without holding her one last time, you see. I love her very much."

The knot in her throat spread to Rose's lungs, and she closed her eyes, squeezing her mother's hand tightly.

"Oh. Did the other lady bring you?"

"Other lady?" echoed Rose, opening her eyes again to see that her son was correct — another woman stood by the TARDIS now, shimmering and transparent like Jackie. She had long, dark hair, pale skin, and her green eyes shone like the brightest green leaves on a new spring day. Rose held her mother's hand tighter, somehow sensing that the visit was nearly over.

"Jackie," said the woman, her voice musical and gentle, "it's nearly time."

Jackie nodded, and leaned closer to her daughter, slipping her hand out of Rose's to touch her cheek. "All you have to do is talk to me," Jackie told her. "That's all, love. I'll hear you."

Rose wasn't sure she'd be able to speak. "How?" she managed to work past her throat.

"I'm not so far away — just walking a different path. Talk, and I'll answer."

Rose nodded, biting her lips and pressing her cheek into her mother's warm hand. "I'm the strange woman in the marketplace, Mum," she said. "Walking on some faraway planet."

Jackie chuckled. "Never to me."

Jackie's hand slipped from Rose's cheek; Rose opened her eyes. Jackie's hand was free of the Doctor now, and already her body was beginning to — not fade, exactly, but break into a million small pieces, colorful and shining, all of which streamed backwards into the blue crossroads, faster and faster. Jackie leaned forward to give her daughter one last fleeting kiss before she slid away, a thousand atoms becoming part of a different path.

"Mum," cried out Rose, falling forward on her knees. "Mum — I love you."

"I'll love you always, mine," came the already ghostly reply, and then Jackie was gone.

Rose broke, the knot which had lodged in her throat suddenly becoming loose, and it spilled out of her in the form of choking sobs as she crouched on the ground beside the Doctor. "I never got to say goodbye. I never–"

A cool hand touched her shoulder, and Rose lifted her eyes to see the dark-haired woman kneeling before her. "You never have to. Your mother is still with you."

"I know you," interrupted Dex. "You're — I don't know who you are. But I know you. Don't I?"

The woman smiled at the boy. "Not quite, no. But if you think about it, you would likely make a very good guess."

Dex wrinkled his nose. "You're — you're in my head, like Dad. I can feel you in there." Dex shook his head, knocking his open palm against his temple as if his ear was filled with water. "I can't get you out, though."

"Do you not like me being there?"

"Usually it's only Dad and Nina, and sometimes Mum. I've never felt anyone else before. Except Janie. I don't think Janie would like you being in my head. You'd better get out."

The woman laughed. "You're very much like your brother."

Dex frowned. "My brother? But I don't have–"

The woman rested a finger on Dex's lips before he could continue. "You'll tell your father this, when he wakes? Tell him I said so."

Dex nodded, eyes somewhat distrustful, and Rose glanced over at the Doctor, still asleep. "When?" she asked, her voice scratchy and shaking. "When will he wake?"

The woman looked quite surprised then. "Why, Rose Tyler — that's up to you."

Rose glanced back at the woman. "Me?"

The woman smiled, and stood. Already she was fading fast, her body breaking away before their eyes, and Rose reached for Dex suddenly, pulling him close to her, afraid the same might happen to him.

"Call his name, Rose Tyler," said the woman. "Wake him with his name."

Then she was gone.

"Mummy?" whispered Dex, looking up at her, his small hands clutching her blouse.

"His name," repeated Rose, still in some sort of haze, and Dex pushed away from her, and leaned over his father's body.

"Dad!" he shouted, but the Doctor didn't move. Dex knelt and shouted directly into his father's ear, using the only other thing he'd ever heard his father called. "_Doctor_!"

"That's not his name," said Rose, still in a haze, but watching her son. She leaned over him then, and touched the Doctor's cheek, cool even to her fingers. He was there — oh, she could feel him, the purple edges of himself pulsing, present and alive. He was asleep, untouchable, racing away every time she drew near.

"What's his name?" asked Dex, almost in tears now. "Mummy?"

Rose brushed the hair back from her face, tucking it behind her ear, and leaned so close over the Doctor that she was nearly lying beside him. She rested her hand against his chest, feeling his hearts beat in a steady rhythm, and she drew her mouth so closely to his ear, she wasn't sure that there was any space in between.

It was a whisper of air…it was a brush of breath…it was the rush of the wind in the trees. It was the music in the stars late at night when the cloud drifts over the moon, and the rustle of clothing as it falls to the floor. It was the trickling of a brook over rocks, the laughter of a far-away child, the hum of contentment and the sigh of regret. It slipped from Rose's lips and into him, an arrow straight into his soul, piercing past the purple barrier and Rose held her breath, waiting.

He opened his eyes.

"Rose," he said, and it was the most beautiful thing she had ever heard him say.


	13. Epilogue

**Title:** A Blue Gravel Path  
**Characters:** The Doctor, Rose Tyler, among others  
**Warnings:** PG. Oh, and it's baby!fic.  
**Spoilers:** For the sake of this story, S4 never happens.

**Epilogue: Of Mothers and Daughters**….. Dex and Janie take a trip.

* * *

**Epilogue: Of Mothers and Daughters**

"The Detective Inspector!"

He groaned, and leaned on the lever. "Too long!"

"The Bobby!"

"They'll think it's short for Robert."

"The Copper?"

"They'll think I'm a penny."

She stamped her foot. "Well, we can't call you the Sergeant, everyone will start saluting you. _I'm_ not going to salute you."

"I don't want you to," he countered, and spun the dial closest to him. "Push the purple button, won't you?"

"Why?"

"Isn't it enough that I asked?"

"No, I want to know why I'm pushing it."

"Because I _asked_."

"But what's it's _do_?"

"Janie, just push the button already!" yelled Dex, and Janie pushed the button, pouting.

"I won't keep traveling with you if you keep yelling at me."

"I'm not yelling!"

"Yes, you are!" Janie yelled back.

"Well, you're being impossible."

"You're being stubborn. I can fly this old rat-trap of a ship–"

The rat-trap of a ship gave a violent shudder, and Janie held onto the control panel for dear life.

"Oh, _fine_. It's a perfectly beautiful ship in tip-top condition and is it really my fault that I want to learn to fly her properly, in case something awful happens to you and I have to get us home on my own?"

"Janie," groaned Dex, and the ship gave another shudder. "Oh, bloody hell — red button, Janie!"

Janie didn't argue; she pressed the red button, and the ship stopped shuddering. For a few minutes, everything ran perfectly smoothly, and the two of them grinned at each other.

And then the ship landed with a powerful crash, and they were both knocked off their feet. Janie smacked her chin on the control panel, and Dex's head landed hard on the grating.

"Ow," wailed Janie, and rubbing his head, Dex crawled over to her.

"Let me see," he ordered, and peered at her chin before giving it a gentle touch. "Oh. Well, I suppose they make good dentures in the 32nd century."

"_Dentures_?" wailed Janie, and Dex grinned.

"You're fine. No dentures."

Janie smacked his arm. "I hate you."

"Well, then, no point in taking you outside," said Dex cheerfully. "We'll just go back home then, shall we?"

Janie leapt to her feet. "Oh, no. If we're in the 32nd century, I want to see it."

"What if we're not?" asked Dex, his eyes glinting mischievously. Janie gave him a hard stare.

"Where are we?"

"Not the 32nd century."

Janie marched down the ramp and threw open the doors. "Ah…it's a hallway."

"But where _is_ the hallway?" said Dex, coming up behind her and taking her hand. "Come on, let's go explore."

Janie gave him a hard look. "That's not said like a Dex who wants to explore. That's said like a Dex who's done the exploring and wants to show off."

"Only one way to find out," he said, and pulled her out of the ship and into the hall. It wasn't like any hall Janie had ever seen; the stones that marked the floor were carefully polished and shining, and the hall was lined with tapestries and gilded mirrors. "Now...let's see…it's right around the corner here."

"What's around the corner?"

"Yup, here we go!" said Dex, and he pushed back the brocade tapestry to reveal a hidden door. He knocked softly, and after a moment, it was opened by a slightly older woman with blonde hair and a relieved expression on her face.

"Oh, good, you've made it," said Rose Tyler. "I was getting anxious. Your dad's nearly done."

"Did she chop off his head?" asked Dex, stepping through the doorway, and pulling Janie in after him.

Janie didn't hear the answer. Her heart was thumping too hard for her to hear much of anything; the blood was rushing in her ears as she took in the tapestries and the magnificent dresses that lined the walls of the small room. She knew those dresses — well, perhaps not those _specific_ dresses. But she'd seen their like in paintings and pictures, and she knew what sort of person wore them. She held onto Dex tightly, even going so far as to hold onto him with both hands so that she wouldn't fall down.

"Janie?"

Rose peered at her, smiling just a little bit, and Janie gave an odd little jump. "Ah, sorry. Where are we?"

"He didn't tell you?"

Janie shook her head. "No, he wanted it to be a surprise."

"Funny sort of surprise," Rose told her son.

He shrugged. "Is Dad done?"

"Go see for yourself," said Rose, and pushed the two of them to the door on the opposite side of the room.

Janie didn't dare let go of Dex's hand. There was something familiar about everything, although she was certain she'd never been in such rooms before. She could sense Dex, of course — the few threads she'd left holding them together had remained strong over the past eighteen years. The soothing green glow of him burned brightly in the back of her mind, just as it always had, but there was something else, too. Something dim and familiar, something she barely recognized.

They stepped into a room, at one end of which was a large, canopied bed. The Doctor sat by it, laughing, and he turned to Janie and Dex with a grin on his face.

"Here they are," he said. "And you thought I'd never return her to you."

The queen sniffed, and Janie dropped Dex's hand, racing to the old woman in the bed.

"Elizabeth," she breathed, wrapping her arms around the woman. The dim, golden glow in the back of her mind built into a crescendo as the woman rested her hands on her head.

"Genevieve."

Janie squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to cry. It was silly, she'd only known the woman for a few days when she was little, and here she was a grown woman of eighteen about to cry her eyes out because the woman she'd wanted as a mother had called her by her given name.

"Did you ask her?" she heard Dex ask.

"That's for you," replied the Doctor.

"Ask me what?" murmured Janie.

"Ma'am?"

Janie's eyes opened. Dex stood by the bed, but wasn't looking at her at all. He looked at Elizabeth, and Janie felt her heart make a curious bounce in her chest.

"Go on, boy," said Elizabeth gruffly, her hands still cradling Janie's head and shoulders.

"I am not exactly your subject, but all the same, I ask your permission — I'd like to keep Janie with me, please. I know you entrusted her to the Doctor here, but I'd like to take care of her, from now on."

"What's that supposed to mean, young man?" asked the woman, sounded extremely distempered. "Are you asking her to marry you?"

"Well, maybe not yet, we're still young for it. But I'd like that, since it's the custom and all. Traditions are good, I think. Janie thinks so too. About traditions, I mean. I don't know about the marriage, I haven't actually asked her. It's kind of moot, if you don't agree, because it's tradition that I'd ask her parents, and that's you. And it's tradition that her queen give her permission, and that's you, too."

"Is there a question in there somewhere?" asked the queen, and the irritation shone.

Janie couldn't see Dex, but she could feel the heat rise in his cheeks all the same.

"Yes. I mean, could I? Marry her. If Janie wants."

Janie pressed her face into the woman's breasts, the smile on her face stretching from ear to ear. The golden glow from Elizabeth grew brighter.

"I see. You might have brought her to me sooner."

"I couldn't," said Dex honestly. Then he leaned forward, and Janie heard him whisper. "But — I could, once Dad's not watching."

"Oi, still here," said the Doctor.

Elizabeth's hand stroked Janie's head, and Janie could feel the old woman shift beneath her. "Child," she said, her tone softening, hesitant. Janie lifted her chin and looked up to see Elizabeth looking down at her, young eyes in an old, painted face, and Janie felt a surge of love for her that stemmed partially from her heart, and partially from the golden glow in her mind. "He's young and stupid, this one."

Dex made a choking sound, but mercifully stayed quiet. Janie smiled just a little. "Not really," she told the queen. "He's just a bit nervous."

"He talks entirely too much and says entirely too little."

"He comes by it honestly, though," Janie replied, her nose in the air, and Elizabeth smiled.

"I suppose he's the only boy you've ever had eyes on."

"I would never tell him otherwise," said Janie, and Dex made another choking sound. Elizabeth burst into laughter.

"You've learned, I see. That's good. I wouldn't marry him just yet, if I were you, not while he's still so green. Give him a few dozen decades, he might settle into his own skin."

"But–" stammered Dex, and the queen sent him a harsh glare.

"Quiet, boy. You're not privy to this. Genevieve. Do you want to marry this boy?"

"Yes," whispered Janie. "Oh, yes."

Elizabeth nodded, stroking the girl's straight ginger hair again and smiling. "Has it been a good life?"

Janie nodded, barely able to speak. Her heart was pounding, waiting for Elizabeth's answer.

"Marry him, then," said Elizabeth, and Janie reached up to hug the woman around the neck, kissing her cheek.

"Thank you!" She looked over at Dex, who was grinning just as widely. He offered his hand and she took it, but before Dex could tug her away, she leaned towards the old woman again and whispered in her ear, so that no one else could hear, "Mother — thank you."

The old woman scoffed, but Janie could see the shine in her eyes, and she let Dex pull her from the bed and back to the door leading out. Just before he reached it, however, it opened again, and Rose popped her head out.

"The other way, please, Dex."

"But–"

Rose shook her head and pointed at another door, and Dex shrugged. Janie thought she caught a glimpse of something behind her soon-to-be mother-in-law, but Rose closed the door before she had a chance to process what it was, and in another moment, Janie and Dex were back in the hallway, with the TARDIS parked not far away.

"That was my mother," realized Janie, the entire moment crashing into her. She frowned, and turned to Dex. "But — it was so short! Why can't I stay longer?"

"Dad said we couldn't," explained Dex. "He said it was all timey-whimey stuff, and we'd understand in a few years."

"A few…_oh_!" Janie began to laugh. "Oh, you're such a ninny — a few years! Oooo, I'm going to get him for that!"

"For what?"

Janie shoved his arm again. "Didn't you look behind your mother in the closet? Didn't you see who was there?"

"No," replied Dex, his brows knit in confusion. "Who was there?"

Janie laughed, and linked her arm through his, pulling him back to the TARDIS. "Well, _I'm_ not going to tell you. But I hope we're married soon, because the sooner we're married, the sooner she'll show up, the sooner we'll get to show her off to her grandmother. Come on, Constable, I know what comes next on this path, and I can't wait another minute."

_Finis_


End file.
